IONE

’TIS a word of rhythmic measure, is that dulcet name, Ione,
 Borrowed from the maids of Athens, meaning aged, or alone.
Can the meaning be prophetic, O my blue-eyed one, my own?

Do you wander by the waters when the sun is warm in May
With young hopes as freshly springing as they did upon a day
Some few years before this writing—six or seven, let us say?

Have you found the world grow colder, have you learned that hopes will fade,
That the winters are more bitter, and more frail the summer shade?
And that nothing is so certain as the fellow with the spade?

For I knew you were ambitious half a dozen years ago;
That you longed for rank and riches. But I also chanced to know
That a loving heart was pulsing in the quiet depths below.

So I watched you like a lover as you jostled in the tide
Of those selfish social wrestlers, with no helper at your side,
And I thought that you might triumph, just by dint of pluck and pride.

But the strife has been a hard one—you are just a little pale—
’Twould have been so grand to triumph; it is no disgrace to fail,
For the odds were high against you, and you were so weak and frail.

Ah, the springs are wet and heavy, and the summers dull and tame.
Black and windy are the autumns—every day shall bear its blame,
But it is not in the seasons—’tis that we are not the same.

Sitting in the grand old forest, listening idly, all alone,
To the gentle pattering raindrops and the pine-tree’s monotone,
Is it wonder that my musing turned upon thee, sweet Ione?

Our two lives have naught in common, and our paths must still diverge;
Yours on quiet inland waters, mine upon the outer surge—
Yours to trill a summer sonnet, mine to chant a winter dirge.

When old age shall find us wanting all the joys we hoped to win,
Striving idly in our weakness with the bitter thoughts within,
Shall we think of sweet Maud Muller, and the things that might have been?