JEAN

Three times round has the sun gone, Jean, Since on your lips I pressed Mute farewells; if that pain was keen Fair were you in your nest.

Smiling, sweetheart, I left you there; You had no word to say; One last touch to your brow and hair, Then I went on my way.

Time it was when the leaves were grown Your rose-colour, my queen; Ere the birds to the south had flown, While yet the grass was green.

Eyes demure, do you ever yearn, Bird-wise to summer lands? Is it to meet your look I turn, Saying, “She understands,”

Saying, “She waits in her quiet place Patient till I shall come, The old sweet grace in her dreaming face That made a Heav'n her home”?

No! She is there‘ neath Northern skies, And no word does she send; But near to my heart her image lies, And shall lie there to the end.

Come what will I am not bereft Of the memory of that time, When in her hands my heart I left There, in a colder clime.

And to my eyes no face is fair, For one face comes between; And if a song has a low sweet air, Through it there whispers, “Jean.”

Better for me the world would say, If I had broke the charm, Set in the circle she one day Made by her round white arm.

Never a king in days of eld Gathered about his throat Such a circlet; no queen e'er held Necklace so clear of mote.

It sufficeth the charm was set; And if it chance that one Still remembers, though one forget, Then is the worst thing done —

Done, and I still can say “Let be; I have no word of blame; Though her heart is no more for me, Mine shall be still the same.”

I have my life to live and she — Well, if it be so — so; She may welcome or banish me And if I go, I go.

Friend, I pray you repress those tears, Comfort from this derive: I am a score — and more-of years And Jean is only five.