If Love and Life Were One

Much have I mused, if love and life were one, How blest were love! how beautiful were life! Which now, so oft, are alien, or at strife; Though each, in bitter wise, makes secret moan Of lamentation—knowing well its own; Each needing each, yet evermore apart; Here—saddest of the twain—the yearning heart, And there the barren life. Ah! thus alone, Existence, empty of its chief delight, Creeps, dull and shallow, to the weary close; And—like some plant shut up in rayless night— Love pales and pines, that in the summer sun Of life had flourished like the garden rose; Would God that ever love and life were one!