TO THE DYING YEAR.
BY J. G. BROOKS.
Thou desolate and dying year! Emblem of transitory man, Whose wearisome and wild career Like thine is bounded to a span; It seems but as a little day Since nature smiled upon thy birth, And Spring came forth in fair array, To dance upon the joyous earth.
Sad alteration! now how lone, How verdureless is nature's breast, Where ruin makes his empire known, In Autumn's yellow vesture drest; The sprightly bird, whose carol sweet Broke on the breath of early day, The summer flowers she loved to greet; The bird, the flowers, Oh! where are they?
Thou desolate and dying year! Yet lovely in thy lifelessness As beauty stretched upon the bier, In death's clay cold, and dark caress; There's loveliness in thy decay, Which breathes, which lingers on thee still, Like memory's mild and cheering ray Beaming upon the night of ill.
Yet, yet, the radiance is not gone, Which shed a richness o'er the scene, Which smiled upon the golden dawn, When skies were brilliant and serene; Oh! still a melancholy smile Gleams upon Nature's aspect fair, To charm the eye a little while, Ere ruin spreads his mantle there!
Thou desolate and dying year! Since time entwined thy vernal wreath, How often love hath shed the tear, And knelt beside the bed of death; How many hearts that lightly sprung When joy was blooming but to die, Their finest chords by death unstrung, Have yielded life's expiring sigh,
And pillowed low beneath the clay, Have ceased to melt, to breathe, to burn; The proud, the gentle, and the gay, Gathered unto the mouldering urn; While freshly flowed the frequent tear For love bereft, affection fled; For all that were our blessings here, The loved, the lost, the sainted dead!
Thou desolate and dying year! The musing spirit finds in thee Lessons, impressive and serene, Of deep and stern morality; Thou teachest how the germ of youth, Which blooms in being's dawning day, Planted by nature, reared by truth, Withers like thee in dark decay.
Promise of youth! fair as the form Of Heaven's benign and golden bow, Thy smiling arch begirds the storm, And sheds a light on every wo; Hope wakes for thee, and to her tongue, A tone of melody is given, As if her magic voice were strung With the empyreal fire of Heaven.