| |
| A MERMAID 1 uprose in a golden dream, | |
| And cried, “come, follow me”— | |
| We glided away, on a swift moon-beam | |
| To the brighest cave of the sea. | |
| |
| ’T was the festal hall of the waves, and there | 5 |
| Bright gems were cluster’d round; | |
| And glowing shells in the liquid air | |
| Made melody of sound. | |
| |
| I danced with the spirits o’er diamond sands | |
| And quaff’d of happiness; | 10 |
| And wore a robe which their fairy hands | |
| Had twined of light and bliss. | |
| |
| I linger’d in ecstacy ’mid the grove | |
| Of corals glancing bright, | |
| And heard the pure song of the Mermaid’s love | 15 |
| For a star in fields of light. | |
| |
| The water-sprites gather’d around to hear | |
| The song that seem’d to wail | |
| With the harmony soft, of the shell-tones clear, | |
| And the surface-sighing gale. | 20 |
| |
| “Oh! come” sung the mermaid, “thou beauteous star, | |
| Come o’er the distant sea; | |
| The bright moon has vanish’d and sail’d afar, | |
| And thou may’st come to me. | |
| |
| Oh! I have watch’d on the cold, cold rock, | 25 |
| And rode the ocean foam, | |
| And laugh’d at the lightning and thunder-shock | |
| As they crush’d my sparry home; | |
| |
| And have wish’d I could catch on the lightning-lance | |
| And guide it back to thee, | 30 |
| For the moon-beam wearies and falls askance | |
| Far e’er it gains thy sea. | |
| |
| I built me a grotto of tinted shells | |
| All glean’d from ocean’s shores, | |
| And sat there uttering fondest spells | 35 |
| ’Mid howling tempest’s roars; | |
| |
| And I hoped thou would’st come—but I hope not now | |
| For coldly thou didst smile, | |
| And I gather’d some nightshade to bind my brow, | |
| And my heart was sad the while. | 40 |
| |
| Yet I love, pretty star, on the rock to sing | |
| And twine in wreaths thy gleam”— | |
| The moon sank down, the dark spread his wing, | |
| And I woke from this lovely dream. | |
