The Doubt

  She sits beside the low window,
    In the pleasant evening-time,
  With her face turned to the sunset,
    Reading a book of rhyme.

  And the wine-light of the sunset,
    Stolen into the dainty nook,
  Where she sits in her sacred beauty,
    Lies crimson on the book.

  O beautiful eyes so tender,
    Brown eyes so tender and dear,
  Did you leave your reading a moment
    Just now, as I passed near?

  Maybe, 'tis the sunset flushes
    Her features, so lily-pale;
  Maybe, 'tis the lover's passion,
    She reads of in the tale.

  O darling, and darling, and darling,
    If I dared to trust my thought;
  If I dared to believe what I must not,
    Believe what no one ought,--

  We would read together the poem
    Of the Love that never died,
  The passionate, world-old story
    Come true, and glorified.