Frozen, in time.
You of the fairest hue I've ever seen alive,
Your childhood you have, you say, in darkness been.
Now grinning, you marvel that the sun is risen high,
To glare into your eyes and burn your peeling skin.
Your hair, you weep, droops like dead flower-stems,
Parched, withered plants succumbed to throes of thirst.
You learned this talk from others - do not listen to them.
To hear them vexes me, to hear you makes my heart to burst:
An empty hall with no one else, your vast abode
Of old, now welcomes in a stranger, new befriended,
Whose presence lights the house as if the heavens glowed
At seeing promise in its nascence splendid!
Rare was it you believed me that the time would turn
And ever smile on you when on the rest it frowned;
Now times are harsh, but free from every grim concern,
Love's flower shall be born, when none else grace the ground:
O you, serene as night, and respite from the blaze -
You never thought your love could bloom in summer, did you?
Fret not; consigned the ill winds are to emptier days -
Now feel the gentle joy the falling snowflakes bid you.
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