TO meet, of all unlikely things,
Here, after all one's wanderings!
But, Emmy, though we meet,
What of this lover at your feet?
For, is this Emmy that I see?
A fragile domesticity
I seem to half surprise
In the evasions of those eyes.
Once a child's cloudless eyes, they seem
Lost in the blue depths of a dream,
As though, for innocent hours,
To stray with love among the flowers.
Without regret, without desire,
In those old days of love on hire,
Child, child, what will you do,
Emmy, now love is come to you?
Already, in so brief a while,
The gleam has faded from your smile;
This grave and tender air
Leaves you, for all but one, less fair.
Then, you were heedless, happy, gay,
Immortally a child; to-day
A woman, at the years’ control:
Undine has found a soul.