1.
Do
you recall the night my love?
That
you and I went rowing?
I
felt most sure that you would prove
The love I thought was growing.
2.
How
plain I see your manly strokes
Which sent our light craft bounding;
How
plain I hear your merry jokes,
Like sweetest music sounding.
3.
The
silv’ry moon shone clear and bright –
I held the tiller, steering;
But
turned my head for fear you might
See all my hope and fearing.
4.
You,
resting on your oars, begun,
(Just like a true born lover)
Saying
you’d sooner row with one
If I would take the other.
5.
Oh
joyous chord on strings of love!
That filled my soul o’erflowing;
I
seized the oar and madly strove
To hide it all by rowing.
6.
What
wonder then (oh thought sublime)
My girlish heart should flutter;
Alas!
we reached shore just in time
To check the words you’d utter.
7.
Next
eve I thought we’d float again,
But ah! fate knows no pity;
You
took an early morning train
Back to the busy city.
July
29, ‘90
Pub.
Cam. Press
This was fairly heavily
re-edited at some point. A few of the more significant:
The original title was ‘To My
Absent Lover’.
‘Oh absent one’ was replaced in the first line
of #6, ‘longing’ with ‘girlish in the second.
The second line in #7 was originally:
‘But cruel fate withheld us’, the fourth: ‘Back to your city labors’.
The following eighth stanza
was crossed out:
The
weary seasons come and go
I’ve hoped your love would waken;
And
too, I’ve hoped, you’ll never now
What is a love forsaken.
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