Why? - Carl Emil Otto

Once in the springtime we loved each other,
   It was long ago,
Brief was the dream and it passed as swiftly
   As the wind and snow.
But once we sat in a dreamland golden,
   On the mountain crest,
Once only, under those beeches olden
   Thy lips I prest.

Full fifteen years, or more perchance,
   Have passed since then.
Nor once — as I gaze across the years —
   Have we met again.
I felt no pang when I knew thee wed,
   My heart was free.
Why at this hour with a sudden dread
   Do I think of thee?

Why? I am sitting with gay companions
   Flushed with wine:
How should I see this night of winter
   That face of thine?
Art thou yearning now with a wild unrest
   For the old joys fled,
Or — a dark foreboding fills my breast —
   Art thou lying dead?

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Carl Emil Otto
Possibly Carl Emil Otto (Weber) (1832 - 1888) Germany
Translated by Lois Saunders