TO THE PICTURE OF A DEAD GIRL.
How pleasing art thou to me, even in death!
I love thee, yet,--above all women living.
THE same-and oh, how beautiful !—the same
As memory meets thee through the mist of years!—
Love's roses on thy cheek, and feeling's flame
Lighting an eye unchanged in all-but tears!
Upon thy severed lips the very smile
Remembered well, the sunlight of my youth;
the shadow that would steal, the while,
To mar its brightness, and to mock its truth!
Once more I see thee, as I saw thee last,
The lost restored, -the vision of the past!
How like to what thou wert-and art not now!
Yet oh, how more resembling what thou art!
There dwells no cloud upon that pictured brow,
As sorrows sits no longer in thy heart;
Gone where its very wishes are at rest,
And all its throbbings hushed, and achings healed;—
I gaze, till half I deem thee to my breast,
In thine immortal loveliness, revealed,
And see thee, as in some permitted dream,
There where thou art what here thou dost but seem!
I loved thee passing well!-thou wert a beam
Of pleasant beauty on this stormy sea!
With just so much of mirth as might redeem
Man from the musings of his misery;
TO THE PICTURE OF A DEAD GIRL.
Yet ever pensive,—like a thing from home!
Lovely and lonely as a single star!
But kind and true to me, as thou hadst come
From thine own element-so very far,
Only to be a cynosure to eyes
Now sickening at the sunshine of the skies!
It were a crime to weep!-'tis none to kneel,
As now I kneel, before this type of thee,
And worship her, who taught my soul to feel
Such worship is no vain idolatry!
Thou wert my spirit's spirit and thou art,
Though this be all of thee time hath not reft,
Save the old thoughts that hang about the heart,
Like withered leaves that many storms have left!
I turn from living looks-the cold, the dull,
To any trace of thee-the lost, the beautiful!
Broken, and bowed, and wasted with regret,
I gaze, and weep-why do I weep alone!
I would not-would not, if I could-forget,
But I am all remembrance,—it hath grown
My very being!-Will she never speak?
The lips are parted, and the braided hair
Seems as it waved upon her brightening cheek,
And smile, and every thing-but breath-are there!
Oh, for the voice that I have stayed to hear,
-Only in dreams,-so many a lonely year!
It will not be ;-away, bright cheat, away!
Cold, far too cold to love!-thy look grows strange;
I want the thousand thoughts that used to play,
Like lights and shadowings, in chequered change!
That smile!-I know thou art not like her, now,-
Within her land-where'er it be of light,
She smiles not while a cloud is on my brow!-
When will it pass away—this heavy night!
Oh! will the cool, clear morning never come,
And light me to her, in her spirit's home!
FLOWER Of my cold and darkened year
Sweet fount amid my spirit's dearth!
Be near me, with the smiles that cheer
The happy home and quiet hearth;
That still, 'mid winter and 'mid night,
Like fairies play their sunny part,
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