Poetical Fragments from Ethel Churchill Volume I/No More

NO MORE


Dream no more of that sweet time
    When the heart and cheek were young;
Dream no more of that sweet time
    Ere the veil from life was flung.
Yet the cheek retains the rose
    Which its beauty had of yore,
But the bloom upon the heart
Is no more.

We have mingled with the false,
    Till belief has lost the charm
Which it had when hope was new!
    And the pulse of feeling warm.
We have had the bosom wrung
    By the mask which friendship wore;
Affection's trusting happiness
Is no more.

We have seen the young and gay
    Dying as the aged die;
Miss we not the laughing voice,
    Miss we not the laughing eye?
Wishes take the place of hope,
    We have dreamed till faith is o'er;
Its freshness made life fair, and that
Is no more.

Take away yon sparkling bowl—
    What is left to greet it now?
Loathing lip that turns away;
    Downcast eye and weary brow.
Hopes and joys that wont to smile,
    Mirth that lit its purple store;
Friends that wont to join the pledge,
Are no more.


Not in Blanchard


Adapted from Moralising in The Literary Gazette, 1st July 1826.
In The New Yorker (1st September 1838), as By-Gone Days

Musical Setting: Romance by Charles Raper, 1840