The Amulet

Ralph Waldo Emerson

1803 to 1882

Poem Image

Your picture smiles as first it smiled;
  The ring you gave is still the same;
Your letter tells, O changing child!
  No tidings since it came.

Give me an amulet
  That keeps intelligence with you,-
Red when you love, and rosier red,
  And when you love not, pale and blue.

Alas! that neither bonds nor vows
  Can certify possession;
Torments me still the fear that love
  Died in its last expression.