A Young Man of Untried Sentiment

Learning by chance that you had been here
Only hours before, and knowing I had
Forgotten to check the bicycles
For a sign of your life rudely
Abutting mine, I tried to predict
In retrospect, whether your mind
Would also have returned you to
This place, in other times before
There was a shadow of a memory
Infused on every wall and path;
And if in glancing skyward perhaps
Only to check the cloud for signs of rain
You noticed that the light was not on
In the third window from the tower.
Did you, in noting this, hurry on
Towards another light where scholars
Of an olive hue would welcome
Your anger into their fold and
Patiently hear out your fervour
Which in them had turned to local politics
And the niceties of small ideas;
Or did the shadows leave you time enough
To pause, and only feeling, to remember
A young man of untried sentiment
Leaning against a banister.