An Hour

You only promised me a single hour:
But in that hour I journeyed through a year
Of life: the joy of finding you,-the fear
Of losing you again,-the sense of power
To make you all my own,-the sudden shower
Of tears that came because you were more dear
Than words could ever tell you,-then,-the clear
Soft rapture when I plucked love’s crimson flower.
An hour,-a year,-I felt your bosom rise
And fall with mystic tides, and saw the gleam
Of undiscovered stars within your eyes,-
A year,-an hour? I knew not, for the stream
Of love had carried me to Paradise,
Where all the forms of Time are like a dream.

by Henry van Dyke