A Discord

It came to pass upon a summer’s day, When from the flowers indeed my soul had caught Fresh bloom, and turned their richness into thought, That—having made my footsteps free to stray— They brought me wandering by some sudden way Back to the bloomless city, and athwart The doleful streets and many a closed-up court That prisoned here and there a spent noon-ray. O how most bitterly upon me broke The sight of all the summerless lost folk!— For verily their music and their gladness Could only seem to me like so much sadness, Beside the inward rhapsody of art And flowers and Chopin-echoes at my heart.