  IN that old beech-walk, now bestrewn with mast, And roaring loud—they linger’d long and late; Harsh was the clang of the last homeward gate That latch’d itself behind them, as they pass’d— Then kiss’d and parted. Soon her funeral knell Toll’d from a foreign clime; he did not talk Nor weep, but shudder’d at that stern farewell; ’Twas the last gate in all their lovers’-walk Without the kiss beyond it! Was it good To leave him thus, alone with his sad mood In that dear footpath, haunted by her smile? Where they had laugh’d and loiter’d, sat and stood? Alone in life! alone in Moreham wood! Through all that sweet, forsaken, forest mile! |
|
