Poems | Page 5

bless
With happy glance the
glorious sky.
She loved such scenes, and as she gazed,
Her face
evinced her spirit's mood;
Beauty or grandeur ever raised
In her, a
deep-felt gratitude.
But of all lovely things, she loved
A cloudless
moon, on summer night,
Full oft have I impatience proved
To see
how long her still delight
Would find a theme in reverie,
Out on the
lawn, or where the trees
Let in the lustre fitfully,
As their boughs
parted momently,
To the soft, languid, summer breeze.
Alas! that
she should e'er have flung
Those pure, though lonely joys away--

Deceived by false and guileful tongue,
She gave her hand, then
suffered wrong;
Oppressed, ill-used, she faded young,
And died of
grief by slow decay.
Open that casket-look how bright
Those jewels flash upon the sight;

The brilliants have not lost a ray
Of lustre, since her wedding day.

But see--upon that pearly chain--
How dim lies Time's discolouring
stain!
I've seen that by her daughter worn:
For, ere she died, a child
was born;--
A child that ne'er its mother knew,

That lone, and
almost friendless grew;
For, ever, when its step drew nigh,
Averted
was the father's eye;
And then, a life impure and wild
Made him a
stranger to his child:
Absorbed in vice, he little cared
On what she
did, or how she fared.
The love withheld she never sought,
She
grew uncherished--learnt untaught;
To her the inward life of thought


Full soon was open laid.
I know not if her friendlessness
Did
sometimes on her spirit press,
But plaint she never made.
The
book-shelves were her darling treasure,
She rarely seemed the time to
measure
While she could read alone.
And she too loved the twilight
wood
And often, in her mother's mood,
Away to yonder hill would
hie,
Like her, to watch the setting sun,
Or see the stars born, one by
one,
Out of the darkening sky.
Nor would she leave that hill till
night
Trembled from pole to pole with light;
Even then, upon her
homeward way,
Long--long her wandering steps delayed
To quit
the sombre forest shade,
Through which her eerie pathway lay.
You
ask if she had beauty's grace?
I know not--but a nobler face
My
eyes have seldom seen;
A keen and fine intelligence,
And, better
still, the truest sense
Were in her speaking mien.
But bloom or
lustre was there none,
Only at moments, fitful shone
An ardour in
her eye,
That kindled on her cheek a flush,
Warm as a red sky's
passing blush
And quick with energy.
Her speech, too, was not
common speech,
No wish to shine, or aim to teach,
Was in her
words displayed:
She still began with quiet sense,
But oft the force
of eloquence
Came to her lips in aid;
Language and voice
unconscious changed,
And thoughts, in other words arranged,
Her
fervid soul transfused

Into the hearts of those who heard,
And
transient strength and ardour stirred,
In minds to strength unused,

Yet in gay crowd or festal glare,
Grave and retiring was her air;

'Twas seldom, save with me alone,
That fire of feeling freely shone;

She loved not awe's nor wonder's gaze,
Nor even exaggerated
praise,
Nor even notice, if too keen
The curious gazer searched her
mien.
Nature's own green expanse revealed
The world, the
pleasures, she could prize;
On free hill-side, in sunny field,
In quiet
spots by woods concealed,
Grew wild and fresh her chosen joys,

Yet Nature's feelings deeply lay
In that endowed and youthful frame;

Shrined in her heart and hid from day,
They burned unseen with
silent flame.
In youth's first search for mental light,
She lived but to
reflect and learn,
But soon her mind's maturer might
For stronger

task did pant and yearn;
And stronger task did fate assign,
Task that
a giant's strength might strain;
To suffer long and ne'er repine,
Be
calm in frenzy, smile at pain.
Pale with the secret war of feeling,
Sustained with courage, mute, yet
high;
The wounds at which she bled, revealing
Only by altered
cheek and eye;
She bore in silence--but when passion
Surged in her soul with
ceaseless foam,
The storm at last brought desolation,
And drove her
exiled from her home.
And silent still, she straight assembled
The wrecks of strength her
soul retained;
For though the wasted body trembled,
The
unconquered mind, to quail, disdained.
She crossed the sea--now lone she wanders
By Seine's, or Rhine's, or
Arno's flow;
Fain would I know if distance renders
Relief or
comfort to her woe.
Fain would I know if, henceforth, ever,
These eyes shall read in hers
again,
That light of love which faded never,
Though dimmed so
long with secret pain.
She will return, but cold and altered,
Like all whose hopes too soon
depart;
Like all on whom have beat, unsheltered,
The bitter blasts
that blight the heart.
No more shall I behold her lying
Calm on a pillow, smoothed by me;

No more that spirit, worn with sighing,
Will know the rest of
infancy.
If still the paths of lore she follow,
'Twill be with tired and goaded
will;
She'll only toil, the aching hollow,
The joyless blank of life to
fill.

And oh! full oft, quite spent and weary,
Her hand will pause, her head
decline;
That labour seems so hard and dreary,
On which no ray of
hope may shine.
Thus the pale blight of time and sorrow
Will shade with grey her soft,
dark hair;
Then comes the day that knows no morrow,
And death
succeeds to long despair.
So speaks experience, sage