George Darley

Lenimina Laborum. 35. Departing Music

Its sweetness fell away
Into the calm of night, like the last wave
That, as the rustling wind blows smoothly o'er,
Spreads wide and wider,—till it lose itself
Upon the heaveless bosom of the sea.
I listened—it was gone! And yet methought
Its echoes, by the ether still undrowned,
Made some far ocean-music in mine ear:
But no!—'twas Memory, so fond to raise
Vain semblances of joys now sepulchred
In the great gloomy Past, the gorge of Time—
Then came one sound, one lost, forgotten sound.
That vanished by me, as a midnight bird
Fleeting upon its dark wing fast away!