But He Loved a Stone

 A Fable
by Innes Randolph 

There lived a man in olden time
 That loved a stone;
 'Twas veined with lines of tender hue,
 With flowers overgrown.
 He wooed it from the flush of dawn
 To twilight lone;
 T'was wondrous lovely, so he thought,
 But still a stone. 

 He tried to cut his name thereon
 And leave a trace
 Of his great love, so deep that Time
 Should not erase.
 He kissed the unrelenting rock
 From cope to base;
 He gashed his breast in clasping it
 With wild embrace. 

 He sought to warm it with his breath,
That icy stone;
 The coldness chilled him unto death,
Through flesh and bone.
 And so he perished then, and lay
 All pale and prone;
 He thought he loved a woman,
but he loved a stone.