Louisa Sarah Bevington

One New Year's Eve

Heart! art thou dead within me? Why this calm
To see thy joy die with the dying year?
When more is fact than ever thou didst fear
Of all thou would'st not have of hurt and harm;
When less than thou hadst pictured is of balm
In uttermost surrender; when more dear
Seems that thou hast surrendered, now and here,
Than ever aught before? Why no alarm
To face the blank black morning of to-morrow
With not one partisan for thine own sorrow?
Why canst thou smile, O silly heart! to see
The cold strewn ruin of the life of thee?
Haply yet more than love's dear joy lies dead,--
Thy very self of self that suffered?