A RECOLLECTION
Clouds of sorrow cannot hide
Gleams of sunshine gilding hours
Of happy memory, sweet as flowers
Ever blooming by the wayside,
Thronged with thorn and thistle.
Reapers binding sheaves of plenty,
Think the golden dreams of twenty
Thrill them deepest; and the whistle
Of some lone love-dreaming bird
In the meadow, wakes to memory
Notes now hushed, but sweeter than the
Ear of mortal ever heard.
'Neath the cliffs near by the river
Long cymes of honey-suckle grew,
Odorous in the air; and the violet, too,
Entangling with the phlox, and ever
Entessellated beds of petal'd mosaic
Stretching out before us, rich
As the drapery of a dream in which
The toil of life was not prosaic.
Neither can the hungry ear
Enfashion music softer, sweeter,
Drawn from lyre, than the meter—
Rippling cascade trickling near.
THE MOONSHINERS
Where the trailing arbutus filled the cove
With a perfume as sweet as the breath of love,
And the mountain ivy's astral bloom
Made radiant light of the darkest gloom,
A maiden dwelt as stainless the while
As the baytree's bloom in the steep defile;
And she loved a youth with a heart as true
As ever has beaten for me or you.
Soon summer passed and the autumn came
With its goldenrod and its sumac flame,
With its tinge of frost and its blood-red blush
That made every shrub a burning bush.
Then love became passion for maiden and youth;
All vision had vanished and life was now truth;
And they heard a voice in the flaming tree
Which told them that marriage was nature's decree.
When the spring beauties came and winter had fled
Sue Winn and Josh Bell were happily wed;
And the cowslips that bloomed in the side of the glen
Were fragrant as roses in the gardens of men.
Their home was a cabin, the mountain above
Was rugged and rough, and their fortune was love:
But a cabin with love and vigor and health
Is better than sin and a palace of wealth.