In moments to delight devoted,
‘My life!’ with tenderest tone you cry;
Dear words! on which my heart had doted,
If youth could neither fade nor die.
To death even hours like these must roll,
Ah! then repeat those accents never;
Or change ‘my life!’ into ‘my soul!’
Which, like my love, exists for ever.
AN OTHER VERSION
You call me still your life.–Oh! change the word–
Life is as transient as the inconstant sigh:
Say rather I’m your soul; more just that name,
For, like the soul, my love can never die.