Ah, useless chiding! The loved ones tender,
Who shared my rambles long ago,
Whose cherished accents could only render
Words of affection soft and low,
Are parted from me, perchance for ever,
By miles of distance, of land or main,—
Death some has taken, and them, oh never
Upon this earth shall I meet again.
’Tis thus this hour of gentle even
Brings back in thought the friends long gone,—
Loved ones with whom this earth was Heaven
But who have vanished, one by one.—
’Tis thus I cherish with wilful sadness
The quiet of my lonely room,—
Careless, unmindful of all earth’s gladness,
Or of her lovely evening bloom.
[EARTH’S MOMENTS OF GLOOM.]
“The heart knoweth its own bitterness”
The heart hath its moments of hopeless gloom,
As rayless as is the dark night of the tomb;
When the past has no spell, the future no ray,
To chase the sad cloud from the spirit away;
When earth, though in all her rich beauty arrayed,
Hath a gloom o’er her flowers—o’er her skies a dark shade,
And we turn from all pleasure with loathing away,
Too downcast, too spirit sick, even to pray!
Oh! where may the heart seek, in moments like this,
A whisper of hope, or a faint gleam of bliss?
When friendship seems naught but a cold, cheerless flame,
And love a still falser and emptier name;
When honors and wealth are a wearisome chain,
Each link interwoven with grief and with pain,
And each solace or joy that the spirit might crave
Is barren of comfort and dark as the grave.
Lift—lift up thy sinking heart, pilgrim of life!
A sure spell there is for thy spirit’s sad strife;
’Tis not to be found in the well-springs of earth,—
Oh! no, ’tis of higher and holier birth.
[AUTUMN WINDS.]
“Oh! Autumn winds, what means this plaintive wailing
Around the quiet homestead where we dwell?
Whence come ye, say, and what the story mournful
That your weird voices ever seek to tell—
Whispering or clamoring, beneath the casements,
Rising in shriek or dying off in moan,
But ever breathing, menace, fear, or anguish
In every thrilling and unearthly tone?”
“We come from far off and from storm-tossed oceans,
Where vessels bravely battle with fierce gale,—
Mere playthings of our stormy, restless power,
We rend them quickly, shuddering mast and sail;
And with their, stalwart, gallant crews we hurl them
Amid the hungry waves that for them wait,
Nor leave one floating spar nor fragile taffrail
To tell unto the world their dreary fate.”