THE BRIDEGROOM

By Rudyard Kipling

Call me not false, beloved,

If, from thy scarce-known breast

So little time removed,

In other arms I rest.

For this more ancient bride

Whom coldly I embrace

Was constant at my side

Before I saw thy face.

Our marriage, often set —

By miracle delayed —

At last is consummate,

And cannot be unmade.

Live, then, whom Life shall cure,

Almost, of Memory,

And leave us to endure

Its immortality.

Ah, would swift ships had never been, for then we ne'er had found,

These harsh Ægean rocks between, this little virgin drowned,

Whom neither spouse nor child shall mourn, but men she nursed through pain

And — certain keels for whose return the heathen look in vain.