“So sweet love seemed”

Robert Bridges (1844–1930)

SO sweet love seemed that April morn,

When first we kissed beside the thorn,

So strangely sweet, it was not strange

We thought that love could never change.

But I can tell—let truth be told—

That love will change in growing old;

Though day by day is naught to see,

So delicate his motions be.

And in the end ’t will come to pass

Quite to forget what once he was,

Nor even in fancy to recall

The pleasure that was all in all.

His little spring, that sweet we found,

So deep in summer floods is drowned,

I wonder, bathed in joy complete,

How love so young could be so sweet.