English Poetry. Amy Levy. The Lost Friend. Эми Леви.

Amy Levy (Эми Леви)

The Lost Friend

The people take the thing of course,
They marvel not to see
This strange, unnatural divorce
Betwixt delight and me.


I know the face of sorrow, and I know
Her voice with all its varied cadences;
Which way she turns and treads; how at her ease
Things fit her dreary largess to bestow.

Where sorrow long abides, some be that grow
To hold her dear, but I am not of these;
Joy is my friend, not sorrow; by strange seas,
In some far land we wandered, long ago.

O faith, long tried, that knows no faltering!
O vanished treasure of her hands and face!--
Beloved--to whose memory I cling,
Unmoved within my heart she holds her place.

And never shall I hail that other ”friend,”
Who yet shall dog my footsteps to the end.

Amy Levy’s other poems:

1. The Old Poet
2. To Vernon Lee
3. Ballade of an Omnibus
4. On the Wye in May
5. The Sick Man and the Nightingale

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