The day you died, that April yesterday,
I was alone in sunny meadow places
When, turning a dark clump of wintry leaves,
I caught a glimpse of exquisite fresh faces
Renewing Earth.
Then, thinking of another April day,
When you and I found bloom beneath the snow,
I sent you happy thoughts across the world
Not dreaming it the hour you were to go—
But yesterday.
Yet O, Not Lost, how many a year shall turn,
And youth and age, lonely for some bright way,
Shall sudden feel you on the face of Earth
And push back death and pluck you like the may—
Immortal song.
—Katherine Hale