They made such toys in days of old—

A shred of golden hair lay curl’d;

Worth all the gold of all the world,

Perchance, to him who shrin’d it so:

Ah, ’twas a hundred years ago!

But, dearest, if he loved as I,

He loves unto eternity.

[35]

[35]

 MOONRISE IN THE ELSTER TANNEN-WALD

Darker than midnight, to the midnight sky

Rises the valley-ridge with all its pines.

Above that gloom a growing radiance shines,

Where the full moon floats up invisibly.

Now, half-revealed, she lifts her disk on high,

When on it, lo! in black and spectral lines

One blasted tree so wild a form designs,

That fear and wonder hold the watcher’s eye.

The minutes pass—and nothing looks the same,

But tangled in a web of silver light

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