It came to pass upon a summer’s day,
When from the flowers indeed my soul had caught
Fresh bloom, and turned their richness into thought,
That—having made my footsteps free to stray—
They brought me wandering by some sudden way
Back to the bloomless city, and athwart
The doleful streets and many a closed-up court
That prisoned here and there a spent noon-ray.
O how most bitterly upon me broke
The sight of all the summerless lost folk!—
For verily their music and their gladness
Could only seem to me like so much sadness,
Beside the inward rhapsody of art
And flowers and Chopin-echoes at my heart.