NEW POEMS
How they stir our spirits vainly
When they come to us Alcest-
Like, returning from the dead!
Not the old love but another,
Bright she comes at Memory's call
Our forgotten vows reviving
To a newer, livelier living,
As the dead child to the mother
Seems the fairest child of all.
Thus our Goethe, sacred master,
Travelling backward thro' his youth,
Surely wandered wrong in trying
To renew the old, undying
Loves that cling in memory faster
Than they ever lived in truth.
CLXXXVIII
TO HENRY JAMES
ADELA, Adela, Adela Chart,
What have you done to my elderly heart?
Of all the ladies of paper and ink
I count you the paragon, call you the pink.
The word of your brother depicts you in part:
"You raving maniac!" Adela Chart:
But in all the asylums that cumber the ground,
So delightful a maniac was ne'er to be found.
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