Words I hope never to use, but I will I guess one day....

A PARTING. 

WITHOUT one bitter feeling let us part; — 

And for the years in which your love has shed 

A radiance like a glory round my head, 

I thank you, yes, I thank you from my heart. 

I thank you for the cherished hope of years, 

A starry future, dim and yet divine, 

Winging its way from Heaven to be mine. 

Laden with joy, and ignorant of tears. 

I thank you, yes, I thank you even more 

That my heart learnt not without love to live, 

But gave and gave, and still had more to give, 

From an abundant and exhaustless store. 

I thank you, and no grief is in these tears; 

I thank you, not in bitterness but truth, 

For the fair vision that adorned my youth 

And glorified so many happy years. 

Yet how much more I thank you that you tore 

At length the veil your hand had woven away, 

Which hid my idol was a thing of clay, 

And false the altar I had knelt before. 

I thank you that you taught me the stern truth, 

(None other could have told and I believed,) 

That vain had been my life, and I deceived, 

And wasted all the purpose of my youth. 

I thank you that your hand dashed down the shrine, 

Wherein my idol worship I had paid; 

Else had I never known a soul was made 

To serve and worship only the Divine. 

I thank you that the heart I cast away 

On such as you, though broken, bruised and crushed, 

Now that its fiery throbbing is all hushed, 

Upon a worthier altar I can lay. 

I thank you for the lesson that such love 

Is a perverting of God's royal right, 

That it is made but for the Infinite, 

And all too great to live except above. 

I thank you for a terrible awaking, 

And if reproach seemed hidden in my pain, 

And sorrow seemed to cry on your disdain, 

Know that my blessing lay in your forsaking. 

Farewell for ever now: — in peace we part; 

And should an idle vision of my tears 

Arise before your soul in after years — 

Remember that I thank you from my heart

A A Proctor