| |
| I THINK on thee in the night, | |
| When all beside is still, | |
| And the moon comes out, with her pale, sad light, | |
| To sit on the lonely hill; | |
| When the stars are all like dreams, | 5 |
| And the breezes all like sighs, | |
| And there comes a voice from the far-off streams | |
| Like thy spirit’s low replies. | |
| |
| I think on thee by day, | |
| ’Mid the cold and busy crowd, | 10 |
| When the laughter of the young and gay | |
| Is far too glad and loud. | |
| I hear thy soft, sad tone, | |
| And thy young, sweet smile I see: | |
| My heart—my heart were all alone, | 15 |
| But for its dreams of thee! | |
| |
| Of thee who wert so dear,— | |
| And yet I do not weep, | |
| For thine eyes were stain’d by many a tear | |
| Before they went to sleep; | 20 |
| And, if I haunt the past, | |
| Yet may I not repine | |
| That thou hast won thy rest, at last, | |
| And all the grief is mine. | |
| |
| I think upon thy gain, | 25 |
| Whate’er to me it cost, | |
| And fancy dwells with less of pain | |
| On all that I have lost,— | |
| Hope, like the cuckoo’s oft-told tale, | |
| Alas, it wears her wing! | 30 |
| And love that, like the nightingale, | |
| Sings only in the spring. | |
| |
| Thou art my spirit’s all, | |
| Just as thou wert in youth, | |
| Still from thy grave no shadows fall | 35 |
| Upon my lonely truth; | |
| A taper yet above thy tomb, | |
| Since lost its sweeter rays, | |
| And what is memory, through the gloom, | |
| Was hope, in brighter days. | 40 |
| |
| I am pining for the home | |
| Where sorrow sinks to sleep, | |
| Where the weary and the weepers come, | |
| And they cease to toil and weep. | |
| Why walk about with smiles | 45 |
| That each should be a tear, | |
| Vain as the summer’s glowing spoils | |
| Flung o’er an early bier? | |
| |
| Oh, like those fairy things, | |
| Those insects of the East, | 50 |
| That have their beauty in their wings, | |
| And shroud it while at rest; | |
| That fold their colors of the sky | |
| When earthward they alight, | |
| And flash their splendors on the eye, | 55 |
| Only to take their flight;— | |
| |
| I never knew how dear thou wert, | |
| Till thou wert borne away! | |
| I have it yet about my heart, | |
| The beauty of that day! | 60 |
| As if the robe thou wert to wear, | |
| Beyond the stars, were given | |
| That I might learn to know it there, | |
| And seek thee out, in heaven! | |
| |
