Let the Past Remain in Peace

Eugene Lee-Hamilton, "Meeting of Ghosts," Sonnets of the Wingless Hours (Portland: Thomas B. Mosher, 1908), p. 65:

When years have passed, is't wise to meet again?
   Body and Mind have changed; and is it wise
   To take old Time, the Alterer, by surprise,
And see how he has worked in human grain?

We think that what once was, must still remain;
   Ourself a ghost, we bid a ghost arise;
   Two spectres look into each other's eyes,
And break the image that their hearts contain.

Mix not the Past and Present: let the Past
   Remain in peace within its jewelled shrine,
And drag it not into the hum and glare;

Mix not two faces in the thoughts that last;
   The one thou knewest, fair in every line,
And one unknown, which may be far from fair.