"If Youth Be a Veil"

                 If youth be a veil,
   Wilt thou love me when it is lifted?
  When time's sure hand and every care
             Hath my beauty sifted?
     Today, it beckons a tender sigh,
     But of tomorrow, I cannot dream
  That even should the shadow remain
    It be more than a nostalgic gleam.
      Your love, should it prove true,
       Is the only beauty I can retain,
       And I wait, breathless and still
         To wonder if it shall remain…
                            ~2015