We are hand in hand in the fields again,
We are treading through the dew!
And not the poet's "barefoot boy,"
Nor him the artist drew,

Is half so brave and bold and good,
Though bright their colors glow,
As the darling playmate that I had
And lost, so long ago!

I touch the spring-time's tender grass,
I find the daisy buds;

I feel the shadows deep and cool,
In the heart of the summer woods;

I see the ripened autumn nuts,

Like thick hail strew the earth;

I catch the fall of the winter snow,

And the glow of the cheerful hearth!

But alas! my playmate, loved and lost,
My heart is full of tears,

For the dead and buried hopes, that are more
Than our dead and buried years:
And I cannot see the poet's rhymes,
Nor the lines the artist drew,

But only the boy that held my hand,
And led my feet through the dew!

LOVE POEMS.

AMY'S LOVE-LETTER.

TURNING Some papers carelessly

That were hid away in a desk unused,
I came upon something yesterday
O'er which I pondered and mused:

A letter, faded now and dim,

And stained in places, as if by tears; And yet I had hardly thought of him Who traced its pages for years.

Though once the happy tears made dim

My eyes, and my blushing cheeks grew hot,

To have but a single word from him,
Fond or foolish, no matter what.

If he ever quoted another's rhymes,
Poor in themselves and commonplace,
I said them over a thousand times,
As if he had lent them a grace.

The single color that pleased his taste
Was the only one I would have, or wear,

Even in the girdle about my waist

Or the ribbon that bound my hair.

Then my flowers were the self-same kind and hue ;

And yet how strangely one forgets

I cannot think which one of the two
It was, or roses or violets!

But O, the visions I knew and nursed,

While I walked in a world unseen before! For my world began when I knew him first, And must end when he came no more.

We would have died for each other's sake,

Would have given all else in the world below; And we said and thought that our hearts would break When we parted, years ago.

How the pain as well as the rapture seems
A shadowy thing I scarce recall,
Passed wholly out of my life and dreams,
As though it had never been at all.

And is this the end, and is here the grave

Of our steadfast love and our changeless faith About which the poets sing and rave,

Naming it strong as death?

At least 'tis what mine has come to at last,
Stript of all charm and all disguise;

And I wonder if, when he thinks of the past,
He thinks we were foolish or wise?

Well, I am content, so it matters not ;
And, speaking about him, some one said

I wish I could only remember what
But he's either married or dead.

DO YOU BLAME HER?

337

DO YOU BLAME HER?

NE'ER lover spake in tenderer words,
While mine were calm, unbroken ;
Though I suffered all the pain I gave
In the No, so firmly spoken.

I marvel what he would think of me,
Who called it a cruel sentence,
If he knew I had almost learned to-day
What it is to feel repentance.

For it seems like a strange perversity,
And blind beyond excusing,

To lose the thing we could have kept,
And after, mourn the losing.

And this, the prize I might have won,
Was worth a queen's obtaining;

And one, if far beyond my reach,

I had sighed, perchance, for gaining.

And I know ah! no one knows so well,
Though my heart is far from breaking
'Twas a loving heart, and an honest hand,

I might have had for the taking.

And yet, though never one beside

Has place in my thought above him,

I only like him when he is by,

'Tis when he is gone I love him.

Sadly of absence poets sing,

And timid lovers fear it;

But an idol has been worshipped less
Sometimes when we came too near it.

And for him my fancy throws to-day
A thousand graces o'er him;

For he seems a god when he stands afar,
And I kneel in my thought before him.

But if he were here, and knelt to me
With a lover's fond persistence,
Would the halo brighten to my eyes

That crowns him now in the distance?

Could I change the words I have said, and say,
Till one of us two shall perish,
Forsaking others, I take this man
Alone, to love and to cherish?

Alas! whatever beside to-day

I might dream like a fond romancer,
I know my heart so well that I know
I should give him the self-same answer.

SONG.

LAUGH out, O stream, from your bed of

Where you lie in the sun's embrace e;
And talk to the reeds that o'er you lean
To touch your dimpled face ;

But let your talk be sweet as it will,
And your laughter be as gay,

green,