To meet, and part, as we have met and parted,
One moment cherished and the next forgot,
To wear a smile when almost broken-hearted,
I know full well is hapless woman's lot;
Yet let me, to thy tenderness appealing,
Avert this brief but melancholy doom—
Content that close beside the thorn of feeling,
Grows memory, like a rose, in guarded bloom.
Love's history, dearest, is a sad one ever,
Yet often with a smile I've heard it told!
Oh, there are records of the heart which never
Are to the scrutinizing gaze unrolled!
My eyes to thine may scarce again aspire—
Still in thy memory, dearest let me dwell,
And hush, with this hope, the magnetic wire,
Wild with our mingled welcome and farewell!
'Tis Now the Promised Hour.
A Serenade.
The fountains serenade the flowers,
Upon their silver lute—
And, nestled in their leafy bowers,
The forest-birds are mute:
The bright and glittering hosts above
Unbar their golden gates,
While Nature holds her court of love,
And for her client waits.
Then, lady, wake—in beauty rise!
'Tis now the promised hour,
When torches kindle in the skies
To light thee to thy bower.
The day we dedicate to care—
To love the witching night;
For all that's beautiful and fair
In hours like these unite.
E'en thus the sweets to flowerets given—
The moonlight on the tree—
And all the bliss of earth and heaven—
Are mingled, love, in thee.
Then, lady, wake—in beauty rise!
'Tis now the promised hour,
When torches kindle in the skies
To light thee to thy bower!
The Songs of Home.
Oh, sing once more those dear, familiar lays,
Whose gliding measure every bosom thrills,
And takes my heart back to the happy days
When first I sang them on my native hills!
With the fresh feelings of the olden times,
I hear them now upon a foreign shore—
The simple music and the artless rhymes!
Oh, sing those dear, familiar lays once more,
Those cheerful lays of other days—
Oh, sing those cheerful lays once more!
Oh, sing once more those joy-provoking strains,
Which, half forgotten, in my memory dwell;
They send the life-blood bounding thro' my veins,
And linger round me like a fairy spell.
The songs of home are to the human heart
Far dearer than the notes that song-birds pour,
And of our very nature form a part:
Then sing those dear, familiar lays once more!
Those cheerful lays of other days—
Oh, sing those cheerful lays once more!
Masonic Hymn.
Our Order, like the ark of yore,
Upon the raging sea was tossed;
Secure amid the billow's roar,
It moved, and nothing has been lost.