The speaker describes a painful rift between herself and delight, something others can’t understand. They see it as an unnatural divorce, but for her it’s simply a fact—joy has gone. She knows sorrow intimately, can trace its voice and movements, yet she refuses to make it a friend, as some do. Joy was once a real companion: together they wandered by distant seas. Now all that remains is a faithful memory, a vanished treasure she clings to with unwavering devotion. The poem moves in a quiet, elegiac mood—nostalgic for what’s lost, but steely at the edges. There’s a sense of endurance, not self-pity. She won’t greet the sorrow that follows her as a friend; it’s simply a presence she must live with until the end. The final couplet lands with a subtle, stubborn grief: she acknowledges sorrow’s persistence, but denies it any welcome.
The Lost Friend — Summary
The people take the thing of course, They marvel not to see This strange, unnatural divorce Betwixt delight and me.
I know the face of sorrow, and I know Her voice with all its varied cadences; Which way she turns and treads; how at her ease Things fit her dreary largess to bestow.
Where sorrow long abides, some be that grow To hold her dear, but I am not of these; Joy is my friend, not sorrow; by strange seas, In some far land we wandered, long ago.
O faith, long tried, that knows no faltering! O vanished treasure of her hands and face!-- Beloved--to whose memory I cling, Unmoved within my heart she holds her place.
And never shall I hail that other "friend," Who yet shall dog my footsteps to the end.