The Poetry Corner

Too Late.

By Madison Julius Cawein

I looked upon a dead girl's face and heard What seemed the voice of Love call unto me Out of her heart; whereon the charactery Of her lost dreams I read there word for word: How on her soul no soul had touched, or stirred Her Life's sad depths to rippling melody, Or made the imaged longing, there, to be The realization of a hope deferred. So in her life had Love behaved to her. Between the lonely chapters of her years And her young eyes making no golden blur With god-bright face and hair; who led me to Her side at last, and bade me, through my tears, With Death's dumb face, too late, to see and know.