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SUNDERED PATHS.
- TWO travellers, worn with sun and rain
- And gropings o’er dim paths unknown,
- Meet where long separate ways have grown
- To one, and then diverge again.
- They halt anigh the green wayside,
- Where groves pant with the impassioned song
- Of nightingales; wild roses throng
- There round them leaning side by side.
- As close and still more close they cling,
- Like some weird tale—once more in dreams
- Lived through with ghastlier horror—seems
- That old, cold, lonely wayfairing.
- Oh close sweet clasp of hands! oh sweet
- Close beat of heart on happy heart;
- Beating as though no more apart
- Their pulses ever again should beat!
- One look of love! one long embrace!
- One kiss that welds two lives in one!
- And lo, the sudden lifted sun
- Lights their slow feet on separate ways.
- Fledged by strong love, their wingèd speech
- Is borne awhile from soul to soul,
- Then ever‐widening waters roll
- And drown their voices each from each.
