Strange fits of passion have I known:

And I will dare to tell,

But in the lover’s ear alone,

What once to me befell.

When she I loved looked every day

Fresh as a rose in June,

I to her cottage bent my way,

Beneath an evening-moon.

Upon the moon I fixed my eye,

All over the wide lea;

With quickening pace my horse drew nigh

Those paths so dear to me.

And now we reached the orchard-plot;

And, as we climbed the hill,

The sinking moon to Lucy’s cot

Came near, and nearer still.

In one of those sweet dreams I slept,

Kind Nature’s gentlest boon!

And all the while my eye I kept

On the descending moon.

My horse moved on; hoof after hoof

He raised, and never stopped:

When down behind the cottage roof,

At once, the bright moon dropped.

What fond and wayward thoughts will slide

Into a Lover’s head!

“O mercy!” to myself I cried,

“If Lucy should be dead!”

They sing their dearest songs— 

    He, she, all of them—yea, 

    Treble and tenor and bass, 

            And one to play; 

      With the candles mooning each face. . . . 

            Ah, no; the years O! 

How the sick leaves reel down in throngs! 

    They clear the creeping moss— 

    Elders and juniors—aye, 

    Making the pathways neat 

            And the garden gay; 

    And they build a shady seat. . . . 

            Ah, no; the years, the years, 

See, the white storm-birds wing across. 

    They are blithely breakfasting all— 

    Men and maidens—yea, 

    Under the summer tree, 

            With a glimpse of the bay, 

    While pet fowl come to the knee. . . . 

            Ah, no; the years O! 

And the rotten rose is ript from the wall. 

    They change to a high new house, 

    He, she, all of them—aye, 

    Clocks and carpets and chairs 

       On the lawn all day, 

    And brightest things that are theirs. . . . 

       Ah, no; the years, the years; 

Down their carved names the rain-drop ploughs.