| |
| WO! for my vine-clad home! | |
| That it should ever be so dark to me, | |
| With its bright threshold, and its whispering tree! | |
| That I should ever come, | |
| Fearing the lonely echo of a tread, | 5 |
| Beneath the roof-tree of my glorious dead! | |
| |
| Lead on! my orphan boy! | |
| Thy home is not so desolate to thee, | |
| And the low shiver in the linden tree | |
| May bring to thee a joy; | 10 |
| But, oh! how dark is the bright home before thee, | |
| To her who with a joyous spirit bore thee! | |
| |
| Lead on! for thou art now | |
| My sole remaining helper. God hath spoken, | |
| And the strong heart I lean’d upon is broken; | 15 |
| And I have seen his brow, | |
| The forehead of my upright one, and just, | |
| Trod by the hoof of battle to the dust. | |
| |
| He will not meet thee there | |
| Who bless’d thee at the eventide, my son! | 20 |
| And when the shadows of the night steal on, | |
| He will not call to prayer. | |
| The lips that melted, giving thee to God, | |
| Are in the icy keeping of the sod! | |
| |
| Aye, my own boy! thy sire | 25 |
| Is with the sleepers of the valley cast, | |
| And the proud glory of my life hath past, | |
| With his high glance of fire. | |
| Wo! that the linden and the vine should bloom | |
| And a just man be gather’d to the tomb! | 30 |
| |
| Why, bear them proudly, boy! | |
| It is the sword he girded to his thigh, | |
| It is the helm he wore in victory. | |
| And shall we have no joy? | |
| For thy green vales, O Switzerland, he died! | 35 |
| I will forget my sorrow—in my pride! | |
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