In Passing

I wish I had known you years ago,

     Your life is unhappy, and so is mine;

Had we known each other our lives of woe

     Might have been changed to lives divine.

I wish I had known you years ago,

But fate, cruel fate, did not will it so.

So you must be strong, I must be strong,

     And drink of the cup with its measure of anguish;

You must meet his scowl with a snatch of song,

     And I must whisper sweet nothings to her.

But O, had I known you long years ago!

We might have been saved this drama of woe.

March 16, 1914