LOST ON BOTH SIDES

As when two men have loved a woman well,

Each hating each, through Love's and Death's deceit;

Since not for either this stark marriage-sheet

And the long pauses of this wedding bell;

Yet o'er her grave the night and day dispel

At last their feud forlorn, with cold and heat;

Nor other than dear friends to death may fleet

The two lives left that most of her can tell:—

So separate hopes, which in a soul had wooed

The one same Peace, strove with each other long,

And Peace before their faces perished since:

So through that soul, in restless brotherhood,

They roam together now, and wind among

Its bye-streets, knocking at the dusty inns.