Even Then

Time does not bring relief, you all have lied
who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
the old snows melt from every mountainside,
and last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;
but last year's bitter loving must remain
heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.
There are a hundred places where I fear
to go, so with his memory they brim,
and entering with relief some quiet place
where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, "there is no memory of him here!"
and so stand stricken, so remembering him,
even then...

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