Winnie’s Christmas Eve.
POOR little Winnie had plodded the street,
Up and down through the rain and sleet,
Singing her innocent songs all day,
In a sweet and merry childish way;
Asking sometimes for the night a bed,
A bowl of milk, or a crust of bread.
She had sung on the corners and city square,
But no one had time to remember her there;
Numbers had passed her who never before
Failed to toss in her basket a penny or more.
It is Christmas; their hearts are so happy and light—
But poor little Winnie’s forgotten to-night.
Chilly and rayless the sky seems to frown,
The clouds, too, are shaking the soft snow-flakes down;
Over her pretty face, waltzing they fall
Into her bonnet and folds of the shawl;
Think of it, fathers, with firesides warm,
Poor little Winnie is out in the storm.
Backward and forward the tired feet go,
From her lips little ripples of music still flow.
Homeless and hungry, still begging for bread,
Receiving a curse and reproaches instead;
Shiv’ring with fear in the pitiless light,
Poor little Winnie is starving to-night.
Alone in the street, yet the little lips move,
Trying to echo those accents of love.
Ah! think of that, mothers! those syllables sweet
Of your darlings, how fondly the same you repeat!
You are trying so faithful to lead them aright
When poor little Winnie is freezing to-night.
See her! How slowly she’s moving along—
Her lips are too icy to echo the song.
How changed are her features! How feeble! how weak!
A pallor creeps over her forehead and cheek—
Perhaps it is only the flickering light,
Ah! no; little Winnie is dying to-night.
The revel is over in parlor and park,
The bonfire vanished, the street is so dark;
The snow-flakes are falling in many a heap,
The city is quiet, at rest, and asleep;
But there in the shadows, scarce out of sight,
Little Winnie lies dead in a snow-drift to-night.
My Heart’s Little Room.
TO LIZZIE, DORA, AND GRACE.
THERE’S a dear little chamber somewhere in my heart
That opens to only you three;
Though many have tried to unfasten the door,
They picked at the lock till their fingers were sore,
For to file it apart
Vainly proved every art,
And in vain have they sought for the key.
Many times I go into this quaint little room,
The pictures to change or adjust;
I see your sweet faces grouped there with my own,
And I wonder that I feel so strangely alone;
But about through the room
I move briskly the broom,
And sweep from the corners the dust.
The windows I throw open wide to the air
To let in the breeze and the light;
I watch the sunbeams in their mischievous way
Creep into the curtains, like children at play,
And while I am there
I have no thought of care,
For the room is so warm and so bright.
And oft I look up from the balcony’s brink
To a sky that shows many a hue;
A vine clambers thickly the window above,
Where my birds sing together their rhythm of love;
My thoughts with them link
For I sit here and think
And all of my song is for you.
Ah! some day I know you will come back to me
To rest in this queer little room;
And that’s why so tidy and clean it is kept,
The air always fragrant, the floor always swept,
For I long here to see
My sweet roses three,
As from buds into blossoms they bloom.
Then come when you may, be the sky black or blue,
The lock will unclasp as of yore;
For (unless Death should come introspecting my heart,
And break down its barriers and wrench them apart),
A friend that is true
Will be watching for you,
Ever waiting to unbar the door.
