[Autumn.]
The autumn winds are moaning round
And through the branches sighing,
And autumn leaves upon the ground
All seared and dead are lying.
The summer flowers have ceased to bloom
For autumn frosts have blighted,
And laid them in a cheerless tomb
By summer sun unlighted.
Thus all our “fondest hopes decay”
Beneath the chill of sorrow,
The joys that brightest seem to-day
Are withered by the morrow.
But there are flowers that bloom enshrin’d
In hearts by love united,
Unscathed by the autumn wind,
By autumn frost unblighted.
And there are hearts that ever thrill
With friendship warm and glowing,
And joys unseared by sorrow’s chill
With hallowed truth o’erflowing.
[Mary’s Grave.]
In a quiet country churchyard
From the city far away,
Where no marble stands in mockery
Above the mould’ring clay;
Where rears no sculptured monument—
There grass and flowers wave
’Round a spot where mem’ry lingers—
My once-loved Mary’s grave.
They laid her down to slumber
In this lonely quiet spot,
They raised no stone above her,
No epitaph they wrote;
They pressed the fresh mould o’er her
As earth to earth they gave—
Their hearts with anguish bursting,
They turned from Mary’s grave.
She knew not much of grief or care
Ere yet by Death’s cold hand,
Her soul was snatched from earth away
To join the spirit band:
Her mild blue eye hath lost its gleam,
No more her sufferings crave
The hand of pity, but the tear
Falls oft o’er Mary’s grave.