Fenton Johnson’s speaker asks where a love that once burned so warmly has gone. The answer is not in fresh, living places—not in morning dew or gentle evening light—but in a dreamlike, unreal space: a “City of Delight” built of air, in the dying smile of day and the face of despair. The love now belongs to illusion and loss, not to the living world. The final image sharpens the mood: a firefly’s faint gleam over a swamp of dead desire, with even a fairy startled by the fire’s passing. There is a quiet bitterness here, a sense that love’s brightness was brief and has settled into something stagnant and sorrowful. The poem creates an eerie, mournful atmosphere, mixing romance with decay.
Death of Love — Summary
Where sinks deep my love, dead love, That so warmly glowed awhile? Where the passion of my dreams And the kiss of afterwhile? In the City of Delight, In the palace built of air, In the smile of dying Day And the vision of Despair.
Not where Morning shakes the dew From the sunshine of her locks ; Not where Evening breathes her flame And the moon so gently rocks ; But where gleams the firefly's wing In the swamp of dead desire ; And a fairy shrinks amazed At the passing of the fire.