A Declaration

With bosom full and swelling like the sea, With deep and tender longing for the form Which everywhere is present unto me, In the warm sunshine and the pelting storm,—

Which calls me and surrounds me everywhere, Whose voice is murmuring in the western wind. I know all nature is indeed most fair, But in all nature her alone I find.

With brittle reed I wrote upon the sand,— “Emma, I love thee!” but the creeping stream Too soon effaced the labour of my hand, As the dank morning breaks a happy dream.

Ah, slippery sand! ah, too, too treacherous wave! I will not trust your frail record again. Emma, I love thee!” I will rather grave In characters which cannot over wane.

To generations of remotest time These golden characters shall surely speak; I will enclose them in incondite rhyme In the immortal page of Once a Week.