The First of May - A Memory

The waters make a music low:     The river reeds     Are trembling to the tunes of long ago,     Dead days and deeds     Become alive again, as on     I float, and float,     Through shadows of the golden summers gone     And springs remote.     Above my head the trees bloom out     In white and red     Great blossoms, that make glad the air about;     And old suns shed     Their rays athwart them. Ah, the light     Is bright and fair!     No suns that shine upon me now are bright     As those suns were.     And, gazing down into the stream,     I see a face,     As sweet as buds that blossom in a dream,     Ere sorrows chase     Fair dreams from men, and send in lieu     Sad thoughts. A wreath     Of blue-bells binds the head, a bluer blue     The eyes beneath.     This is my little Annies face;     My child-sweetheart     Whom long ago I lost in that dark place     Where all lives part.     Beside me still I see her stand,     Who is no more.     She walked with me through childhood, hand in hand,     But at the door     Of youth departed from me. Fain     Was I that day     To go with her. Ah, sweetheart, come again     This First of May!