Only a Sad Mistake

Only a blunder—a sad mistake; All my own fault and mine alone. The saddest error a heart can make; I was so young, or I would have known.

Only his rare, sweet, tender smile; Only a lingering touch of his hand. I think I was dreaming all the while, The reason I did not understand.

Yet, somewhere, I've read men woo this way; That eyes speak, sometimes, before the tongue. And I was sure he would speak some day; Pardon the folly—I was so young.

Was I, say—for now I am old! So old, it seems like a hundred years Since I felt my heart growing hard and cold With a pain too bitter and deep for tears.

I saw him lean over the stranger's chair, With a warm, new light in his beautiful eyes; And I woke from my dreaming, then and there, And went out of my self-made Paradise.

He never loved me—I know, I see! Such sad, sad blunders as young hearts make. She did not win him away from me, For he was not mine. It was my mistake.

A woman should wait for a man to speak Before she dreams of his love, I own; But I was a girl—girls' hearts are weak; And the pain, like the fault, is mine alone.