For she, my love, my fate, she sat by my side
On a fallen oak, her cheek all flushed with a bashful shame,
Telling me what her innocent heart had hid—
"For was not I her brother, her dear brother, all but in name."
I listened to her low words, but turned my face away—
Away from her eyes' soft light, and the mocking light of the day.
"He was noble and proud," she said, "and had chosen her from all
The haughty ladies, and great; she didn't deserve her lot."
I knew her peer could never be found in palace or hall,
And my white face told my thought, but she saw it not.
She was crushing some scarlet leaves in her dainty fingers of snow,
Her maiden joy crowning her face with a radiant glow.
"She had wanted me to know," and then a smile and a blush;
Her smile was always just like a baby's smile, and the red
Came to her cheek at a word or a glance—then there fell a hush.
She was waiting some word from me, I knew, so I said,
"May Heaven bless you both"—words spoken full quietly,
And she, God bless her, never knew how much they cost to me.
How the sumac banners bent, dripping as if with blood,
What a mournful presence brooded upon the slumbrous air;
A mocking-bird screamed noisily in the depths of the silent wood,
And in my heart was crying the raven of despair,
Thrilling my being through with its desolate, desolate cry—
"It were better to die, it were better to die."
The white dawn follows the darkness; out of the years' decay
Shineth the golden fire that gildeth the autumn with light;
From another's sin and loss, cometh this good to me,
By another's fall am I raised to this blissful height.
"Let me be humble," said my heart, as from her sweet lips fell,
"Let a prayer for him arise, with the sound of our marriage bell."
THE FAIREST LAND.
'Twas a bleak dull moor that stretched before
The low stone porch of the cottage door,
And standing there was youth and maid,
He for long journeying seemed arrayed,
And the sunset flamed in the burnished west,
And a proud throb beat in the young man's breast,
As he whispered, "Sweet, will you come to me
In that fairer land beyond the sea?"
"The wonderful western land; in dreams
I have seen its prairies green, and gleams
Of its shining waterfalls, valleys fair,
And a voice in my dreams has called me there
Where man is a man, and not a clod,
And must bend the knee to none but God.
A home will I make for thee and me
In that fairer land beyond the sea."
"But the cruel seas where the fated ships
Go down to their doom"—But he kissed the lips—
The trembling lips, till they smiled again,
And his bright hopes cheered her heart's dull pain,
And she laid her head on his hopeful breast,
And looked with him to the glowing west,
And said, "I will come, I will come to thee
To that fairer land beyond the seas."
And the crimson light changed to daffodil—
To ashen gray, but they stood there still,
And high o'er the west shone the evening star
As still he pictured that home afar—
"The peace and the bliss our own at last
When this dreary parting all is past,
When my heart's dear love, you come to me
In that fairer land beyond the sea."