| |
| YE wavering shapes, again ye do enfold me, | |
| As erst upon my troubled sight ye stole; | |
| Shall I this time attempt to clasp, to hold ye? | |
| Still for the fond illusion yearns my soul? | |
| Ye press around! Come then, your captive hold me, | 5 |
| As upward from the vapoury mist ye roll; | |
| Within my breast youth’s throbbing pulse is bounding, | |
| Fann’d by the magic breath your march surrounding. | |
| |
| Shades fondly loved appear, your train attending, | |
| And visions fair of many a blissful day; | 10 |
| First-love and friendship their fond accents blending, | |
| Like to some ancient, half-expiring lay; | |
| Sorrow revives, her wail of anguish sending | |
| Back o’er life’s devious labyrinthine way, | |
| And names the dear ones, they whom Fate bereaving | 15 |
| Of life’s fair hours, left me behind them grieving. | |
| |
| They hear me not my later cadence singing, | |
| The souls to whom my earlier lays I sang; | |
| Dispersed the throng, their severed flight now winging; | |
| Mute are the voices that responsive rang. | 20 |
| For stranger crowds the Orphean lyre now stringing, | |
| E’en their applause is to my heart a pang; | |
| Of old who listened to my song, glad hearted, | |
| If yet they live, now wander widely parted. | |
| |
| A yearning long unfelt, each impulse swaying, | 25 |
| To yon calm spirit-realm uplifts my soul; | |
| In faltering cadence, as when Zephyr playing, | |
| Fans the Aeolian harp, my numbers roll; | |
| Tear follows tear, my steadfast heart obeying | |
| The tender impulse, loses its control; | 30 |
| What I possess as from afar I see; | |
| Those I have lost become realities to me. | |
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