From “The Angel in the House”
I GREW assured, before I asked,
  That she ’d be mine without reserve,
And in her unclaimed graces basked
  At leisure, till the time should serve,—
With just enough of dread to thrill
  The hope, and make it trebly...

So sweet love seemed that April morn,
When first we kissed beside the thorn,
So strangely sweet, it was not strange
We thought that love could never change.

But I can tell—let truth be told—
That love will change in growing old;
Though day by day...