NEVER seek* to tell thy love,
Love that never told can be;
For the gentle wind does move
Silently, invisibly.
I told my love, I told my love,
I told her all my heart;
Trembling, cold, in ghastly fears,
Ah! she doth depart.
Soon as she was gone from me,
A traveller came by,
Silently, invisibly:
He took her with a sigh.
- William Blake, "Never Seek to Tell Thy Love"
* Note 1 - I give here the earlier and incomparably finer version of this song, which Blake subsequently altered by cancelling the first stanza (after changing ‘seek’ to ‘pain’ in l. 1), and substituting ‘O! was no deny’ for the concluding line of the poem.
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