Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 11/Long expected
LONG EXPECTED.
I.
In expectation, all the year,
I watch and wait, I watch and wait;
I keep within a court of state;
Perchance, e’en now, the time is near.
II.
For who can tell the very day
When he shall sail love’s tropic seas,
Borne on by sweetest fantasies
To golden regions far away?
III.
The spring-time comes, and hope is high,
For winter’s snows are past and gone,
The summer seems to call me on,
The violets whisper “She is nigh.”
IV.
Sweet summer cometh, crowned with flowers,
And then my heart of hearts is gay,
For to myself I often say,
“My love will choose the summer hours.”
V.
But summer fades to autumn’s gold,
Yet still I watch and still I wait;
I think—“My love, she cometh late,
The days are short, the nights are cold.”
VI.
Then winter follows, dark and sere,
And then I trim my beacon-light,
To guide her through the darkest night,
And so I measure out the year.
VII.
And thus the rolling years pass by:
At times I think “She will not come,
Perchance the way is wearisome
And dark, beneath a wintry sky.”
VIII.
But yet I know she comes from far,
As surely as the silver light,
Flashing for ages through the night,
From some yet undiscovered star.
IX.
And so I keep my court of state,
With all my heart in solemn dress;
With everything in readiness,
I watch and wait, I watch and wait;
X.
Gazing towards the eastern sky,
Waiting the coming of the morn,
The first faint dashing of the dawn,
Waiting and watching—till I die.