I.

I stood on the brink in childhood,

And watched the bubbles go

From the rock-fretted, sunny ripple

To the smoother tide below;

And over the white creek-bottom,

Under them every one,

Went golden stars in the water,

All luminous with the sun.

But the bubbles broke on the surface,

And under, the stars of gold

Broke; and the hurrying water

Flowed onward, swift and cold.

II.

I stood on the brink in manhood,

And it came to my weary brain,

And my heart, so dull and heavy

After the years of pain,––

30

That every hollowest bubble

Which over my life had passed

Still into its deeper current

Some heavenly gleam had cast;

That, however I mocked it gayly,

And guessed at its hollowness,

Still shone, with each bursting bubble,

One star in my soul the less.