Poem by Rudyard Kipling

An Auto-da-fé

And did you love me then so much
As you say you did? What made you write
The Love you bore in black and white—
Drop pen-cease loving—end it all,
And give me for greeting the palm's mere touch
In place of a cheek where my kiss should fall?

Now we are sundered, is it strange
That we meet each other and say no word?
Do you think of that time when our hearts were stirred
By less than a murmur? How—once, I kept
Watch and ward o'er the long street's range 
Of passionless stucco, while you slept.

Somewhere, in peace, a maiden's slumber—
And I stood through the night, till morning's glow
Cleared the smoke from the parks below,
And you came with the dawn? How one remembers! 
In my heart I have still the name and number—
Wherefore I place my pile on the embers.

1. Before My Spring
2. A Legend of Devonshire
3. Rosicrucian Subtleties
4. Resolve
5. The Floods

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