I am beside the lake,
The lonely lake which used to be
The wide world of the beating heart
When I was, love, with thee.
I see the quiet evening lights
Amid the distant mountains shine;
I hear the music of a lute,
It used to come from thine.
How can another sing the song,
The sweet sad song that was thine own
It is alike, yet not the same,
It has not caught thy tone.
Ah, never other lip may catch
The sweetness round thine own that clung;
To me there is a tone unheard,
There is a chord unstrung.
Thou loveliest lake, I sought thy shores,
That dreams from other days might cast,
The presence elsewhere sought in vain,
The presence of the past.
I find the folly of the search,
Thou bringest but half the past again;
My pleasure calling faintly back
Too vividly my pain.
Too real the memories that haunt
The purple shadows round thy brink—
I only ask'd of thee to dream,
I did not ask to think.
False beauty haunting still my heart,
Though long since from that heart removed;
These waves but tell me how thou wert
Too well and vainly loved.
Fair lake, it is all vain to seek
The influence of thy lovely shore—
I ask of thee for hope and love—
They come to me no more.