I should have known I'd cry this way.
I just forgot somehow.
Although I shed them years ago,
The last ones fell just now.
I held your picture in my hand
And teardrops fell like rain.
I saw that twinkle in your eyes
And was a child again.
My love, your gift is one fine thing
That makes it all worthwhile.
The wait of more than forty years
To see your childhood smile.
I tried for years to just recall
The way you used to be.
Then when I saw your photograph,
It all returned to me.
The flaming love that I once felt,
Was just as it had been.
Delivered with your precious gift
Of how you looked back then.
There's nothing more for me to do;
But sit, and stare, and cry.
I'm much too old to do much else
Before my time to die.
There's nothing more for me to say,
I've told it all to you.
My love, you are the one affair
I've had my whole life through.
I guess it takes a little time,
Just more than forty years.
I know I cut it long ago;
My, long, long trail of tears.
GREENWOLFE 1962
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/my-long-long-trail-of-tears/
