To ---- (Long Ago Dead.)

I am lonelier, lonelier, Dear, to-day Than ever I’ve been before: And the restless old ocean, foam-fretted alway, Moans only of days of yore.

But somehow my heart is so sad in life’s whirl, And my life is so shut in its shell, Tho’ it heal every wound o’er with purest of pearl Of naught but the sea will it tell.

Oh, lonely and lorn as the bittern’s boom, I haunt every solitude known, Only to find from the wide world’s room A nameless something has flown.

I know not the reason, and fear nor I care; I only know I am lonelier, Dear, As over the well-wonted moorland I fare, Than ever the death-wept tear.

How lonely, Dear! how long the time!-- But I’ll bear it, I’ll bear it for thee, That at last I may join in the glad-voiced chime Far out on the crystal sea.

I’SE SEEN A LIGHT IN DE SKY.