Read "Sorrow's Shadow" by Fannie Stearns Davis online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Some days, when I am dressed in shimmer-stuff, With yellow roses at my breast and hair; When just the air and sunlight seem enough To make the whole world delicately rare; When people love me, and I them, and all My heart is like a hill-brook's lilting call:
Then, if I pass her, in her dim black dress, With heavy eye-lids darkened by old tears, I feel a sudden clutch of loneliness; I stare down vistas of unsparkling years, And there behold myself, clad close in black, With tired brows, thin hands, and aching back.
O Sorrow's Shadow! let me be awhile! Wreck not my happy yellow roses: set No watch upon my sudden cry and smile. Why should I not forget -- ah, half forget! -- That Sorrow's Self will meet me some strange day, And take my hand, nor let me dance away?