She stood upon the grave of her dead truth,
       And saw her soul’s bright armor red with rust,
     And knew that all the riches of her youth
       Were Dead Sea apples, crumbling into dust.

     Love that had turned to bitter, biting scorn,
       Hearthstones despoiled, and homes made desolate,
     Made her cry out that she was ever born,
       To loathe her beauty and to curse her fate.

     NEW AND OLD.

     I and new love, in all its living bloom,
       Sat vis-a-vis, while tender twilight hours
       Went softly by us, treading as on flowers. 
     Then suddenly I saw within the room
     The old love, long since lying in its tomb. 
       It dropped the cerecloth from its fleshless face
       And smiled on me, with a remembered grace
     That, like the noontide, lit the gloaming’s gloom.

     Upon its shroud there hung the grave’s green mould,
       About it hung the odor of the dead;
       Yet from its cavernous eyes such light was shed
     That all my life seemed gilded, as with gold;
       Unto the trembling new love ’"Go,” I said
     “I do not need thee, for I have the old.”

     NOT QUITE THE SAME.

     Not quite the same the spring-time seems to me,
       Since that sad season when in separate ways
       Our paths diverged.  There are no more such days
     As dawned for us in that lost time when we
       Dwelt in the realm of dreams, illusive dreams;
       Spring may be just as fair now, but it seems
          Not quite the same.

     Not quite the same is life, since we two parted,
       Knowing it best to go our ways alone. 
       Fair measures of success we both have known,
     And pleasant hours, and yet something departed
       Which gold, nor fame, nor anything we win
       Can all replace.  And either life has been
          Not quite the same.

     Love is not quite the same, although each heart
       Has formed new ties that are both sweet and true,
       But that wild rapture, which of old we knew,
     Seems to have been a something set apart
       With that lost dream.  There is no passion, now,
       Mixed with this later love, which seems, somehow,
          Not quite the same.

     Not quite the same am I. My inner being
       Reasons and knows that all is for the best. 
       Yet vague regrets stir always in my breast,
     As my soul’s eyes turn sadly backward, seeing
       The vanished self that evermore must be,
       This side of what we call eternity,
          Not quite the same.

FROM THE GRAVE.

When the first sere leaves of the year were falling,
I heard, with a heart that was strangely thrilled,
Out of the grave of a dead Past calling,
A voice I fancied forever stilled.