This sweetest bud of promise to her given;
Short as an angel’s visit was its stay,
When God, who gave it, took it up to heaven.
Ah, what a contrast one short year presents!
Replete with happiness—replete with woe;
In that brief space, a maiden called, and wife,
Widow and mother written—childless too.
Surely my friend, I need not say to thee,
Look not to earth for what it can’t bestow;
’Tis at the best a frail and brittle reed,