C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

Richard Monckton Milnes, Lord Houghton (1809–1885)

I WANDERED by the brookside,

I wandered by the mill,—

I could not hear the brook flow,

The noisy wheel was still;

There was no burr of grasshopper,

No chirp of any bird,

But the beating of my own heart

Was all the sound I heard.

I sat beneath the elm-tree,

I watched the long, long shade,

And as it grew still longer,

I did not feel afraid;

For I listened for a footfall,

I listened for a word—

But the beating of my own heart

Was all the sound I heard.

He came not,—no, he came not,—

The night came on alone;

The little stars sat one by one,

Each on his golden throne:

The evening air passed by my cheek,

The leaves above were stirred—

But the beating of my own heart

Was all the sound I heard.

Fast silent tears were flowing,

When something stood behind,—

A hand was on my shoulder,

I knew its touch was kind;

It drew me nearer—nearer—

We did not speak one word,

For the beating of our own hearts

Was all the sound we heard.