Mary Dean.
THE VISION OF THE TARN.
Alone, in contemplation lost,
I stood upon a castled height,
Dark-beetling o'er a lurid tarn
That glassed the brow of night.
Between the icy flash of stars,
Above me sprinkled and beneath,
The silence of the listening air
Was counterfeit of death.
No cloud upon the naked sky,
No ripple on the lake below;
But o'er the sluggish waters hung
A phosphorescent glow,
That suddenly, all quivering wan,
As smitten with the throes of birth,
Upheaving, vanished, to reveal
A phantom not of earth—
A lily wonderful as light,
Unfolded on the balmy deep,
And, cradled in its bosom, lay
A presence lost in sleep.
And tenderly a star remote
Shed holy lustre o'er the place
Where innocence and peace displayed
Such unimagined grace
That e'en the calm celestial orb,
Enamored of the dream below,
With tremulous emotion pale
Diffused a milder glow.