html.skin-theme-clientpref-night @media(prefers-color-scheme:dark){html.skin-theme-clientpref-os }AN ear that caught my slightest tone,
In kindness or in anger spoken;
An eye that ever watch'd my own,
In vigils death alone has broken;
Its changeless, ceaseless, and unbought
Affection to the last revealing;
Beaming almost with human thought,
And more—far more than human feeling!
Can such in endless sleep be chill'd,
And mortal pride disdain to sorrow,
Because the pulse that here was still'd
May wake to no immortal morrow?
Can faith, devotedness, and love,
That seem to humbler creatures given
To tell us what we owe above,—
The types of what is due to Heaven,—
Can these be with the things that were,
Things cherish'd—but no more returning,
And leave behind no trace of care,
No shade that speaks a moment's mourning?
Alas! my friend, of all of worth
That years have stolen or years yet leave me,
I've never known so much on earth,
But that the loss of thine must grieve me.