“Tears, idle tears”

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892)

From “The Princess”

TEARS, idle tears, I know not what they mean,

Tears from the depth of some divine despair

Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,

In looking on the happy autumn fields,

And thinking of the days that are no more.

Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,

That brings our friends up from the under world;

Sad as the last which reddens over one

That sinks with all we love below the verge,—

So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.

Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns

The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds

To dying ears, when unto dying eyes

The casement slowly grows a glimmering square;

So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.

Dear as remembered kisses after death,

And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned

On lips that are for others; deep as love,

Deep as first love and wild with all regret,—

O Death in Life, the days that are no more.