WRITTEN BY ELLEN LOUISA TUCKER SHORTLY BEFORE
HER MARRIAGE TO MR. EMERSON
Love scatters oil
On Life's dark sea,
Sweetens its toil—
Our helmsman he.
Around him hover
Odorous clouds;
Under this cover
His arrows he shrouds.
The cloud was around me,
I knew not why
Such sweetness crowned me.
While Time shot by.
No pain was within,
But calm delight,
Like a world without sin,
Or a day without night.
The shafts of the god
Were tipped with down,
For they drew no blood,
And they knit no frown.
I knew of them not
Until Cupid laughed loud,
And saying "You're caught!"
Flew off in the cloud.
O then I awoke,
And I lived but to sigh,
Till a clear voice spoke,—
And my tears are dry.
THE VIOLET
BY ELLEN LOUISA TUCKER
Why lingerest thou, pale violet, to see the dying year;
Are Autumn's blasts fit music for thee, fragile one, to hear;
Will thy clear blue eye, upward bent, still keep its chastened glow,
Still tearless lift its slender form above the wintry snow?
Why wilt thou live when none around reflects thy pensive ray?
Thou bloomest here a lonely thing in the clear autumn day.
The tall green trees, that shelter thee, their last gay dress put on;
There will be nought to shelter thee when their sweet leaves are gone.
O Violet, like thee, how blest could I lie down and die,
When summer light is fading, and autumn breezes sigh;
When Winter reigned I'd close my eye, but wake with bursting Spring,
And live with living nature, a pure rejoicing thing.
I had a sister once who seemed just like a violet;
Her morning sun shone bright and calmly purely set;
When the violets were in their shrouds, and Summer in its pride,
She laid her hopes at rest, and in the year's rich beauty died.
THE AMULET
Your picture smiles as first it smiled;
The ring you gave is still the same;
Your letter tells, O changing child!
No tidings since it came.
Give me an amulet
That keeps intelligence with you,—
Red when you love, and rosier red,
And when you love not, pale and blue.
Alas! that neither bonds nor vows
Can certify possession;
Torments me still the fear that love
Died in its last expression.