Lays of Ancient Virginia | Page 4

pale:?The cold stars twinkled far above,?And danced, with their bright eyes of love;?The gleaming waters did rejoice,?And breathed a soft, enamored voice;?The sleeping zephyr on his flowers,?Awaked to bless the gliding hours?Which gave this tiny being, birth,?A bliss, a Blessing to the earth.?She was, in truth, a beauteous child:?At three years old her eyes were wild?With something of a playfulness;?And then she had the softest tress?Of auburn tint, that fell and flew?About her neck of damask hue.?To watch throughout the Summer day,?The butterfly's capricious play,?Or humming bird's bright, rainbow wings,?And all gay, joyous, natural things.?To hear the poets of the grove,?Sing forth their little lays of love;?Or to survey the stars come forth,?Or dancing rainbows hug the earth:?These were the pastime and the play,?That whiled her infant hours away.?And blest was sylvan Elfindale,?With child so fair within its pale.
That was a bland and holy morn,?Like one, on very purpose, born,
A gray godmother stood,?Before the chancel's sacred place,?With Frankie's sweet and artless grace,
And heard the preacher good.?And as the bright baptism fell,?Upon her fallen tresses well,?And o'er her bosom's chastened swell,
The beauteous maiden smiled:?She looked a wingless cherub then--?My inmost spirit fluttered, when
I said, O wondrous child!?I thought a troop of angels stood?Amid that lofty fane,?And (I in that ecstatic mood)?They sped to bliss again.?That, whole bright day, I wandered wide,
O'er sunny hill and vale,?And thought no day of brighter pride
E'er lay on Elfindale;?I thought, that day dear Frankie love,?Had been new-linked with those above;?And henceforth angels would attend?The maiden, to her journey's end.
Fair Frankie grew in attributes?That harmonized like golden flutes,
Or harps of silver strain:?She loved the Lovely--growing so,?With every year's advancing flow;--
She was the Death of Pain!?The dwellers in green Elfindale,
Were happier all for her,?The very flowers she loved to trail,
With pleasure's thrill, would stir.?She loved both man and brute that dwelt
Within that vale of Good;?And they, as bettered beings, felt
New virtue--as they should.?And thus a shining, golden chain,
Of many links of love,?Knit Frankie to the peopled plain,
And to the good above.?Affection's wreathed rings of beauty,
Bound round a globe of gold;?It is my verse's pleasing duty,
To say to all, behold,?Sweet Frank that central globe of worth;?That gems, with pride, this spot of earth,?This flower-engirdled, blissful vale,?This heart-delighting Elfindale.
And now when lovely Frankie stood,?In the dear pride of womanhood,
The queen of Elfindale;?One sought her for her loveliness--?A joy--a heaven of happiness--?An earth-born angel meant to bless?My throbbing soul with rich excess
Of joys that never fail.?She sat hid in a garden bower,
Watching the first, sweet star,?That crowns the lovely twilight hour,
And glows to earth from far.?A sad sweet dream oppressed her thought,
And tinged her calm, white face;?Her eyes fixed fast, their radiance fraught,
With melancholy grace.?I stole unto her close retreat,
As winds creep on a vale;?And, standing, gazed upon the sweet,
Sweet queen of Elfindale.?She turned her head, she faintly smiled,
She bent her gaze on me;?It made my very spirit wild,
With thrilling ecstacy.?I caught and clasped, her to my heart,
Yet never spoke a word;--?But the twin-vow that could not part,
By Love in Heaven was heard.
PART SECOND.
Again unto the lofty fane,?Sweet Frankie lightly went;?With smiling joy and same of pair?Upon her features blent.?Again, as on that sunny morn,?When white-winged angels stood,?To see her, of bright water, born,?Before the preacher good.?Again within the chancel's gloom,?She sweetly, gently stands;?With marriage hymn, with rich perfume,?With Hymen's happy bands;?With wild-rose wreaths, with gayest bloom,?And wreathed maiden's hands.?But, now she stands with me even there,?With sweetly downcast eyes,?So purely white, so passing fair,?Like one of Paradise.?The preacher speaks the solemn words,?Yet fraught with deepest bliss;?We twain in one are bound by chords,?With sob--with clasp--with kiss.?Returning from that sacred place,?All earth and sky rejoiced,?And all the winds and waters' race?Their compliments then voiced.?The birds sang sweetly on the spray,?As they ne'er sang before;?And love lay o'er the world away,?A robe of golden ore.
And now, we live in Elfindale,?Dear Frank and I together;?And there is light on this sweet dale,?In calm, or stormy weather.?A fairy daughter leaps between?Our nightly moving paces;?Upon whose soft and marble brow,?Gleam many artless graces.?We dwell, we dwell, in Elfindale--?I--child--and happy mother;?And, if earth holds a sweeter vale,?We cannot wish another.?Life has been arched with bluer skies,?By curved rainbows brighter;?And nature--ah! what wondrous dyes,?Now lavishly bedight her.?Love has become a glorious robe,?With thickest gold o'erladen;?And now we dwell upon a globe?Which is, indeed, an Aidenn.?I dwell with fixed eyes upon?My wife and cherub maiden,?I feel the light of that fire-sun,?That broadly shines on Aidenn,--?And all our days that brightly run,?Are heavily joy-laden--?And now we know our grief is done,?And that we dwell in Aidenn.
OF A SKYLARK.
At dawn I rose from silent sleep,?And heard a sky-lark singing,?Amid the azure far and deep,?Till all the arch was ringing.
And now, as deeper, deeper still?His form sank into heaven,?Me-seemed his heart's concentered thrill,?To his loved Lord was given.
If I possessed such