Leave me not yet! Leave me not cold and lonely,
Thou star of promise o'er my clouded path!
Leave not the life that borrows from thee only
All of delight and beauty that it hath!
Thou that, when others knew not how to love me,
Nor cared to fathom half my yearning soul,
Didst wreathe thy flowers of light around, above me,
To woo and win me from my grief's control:
By all my dreams, the passionate and holy,
When thou hast sung love's lullaby to me,
By all the childlike worship, fond and lowly,
Which I have lavish'd upon thine and thee:
By all the lays my simple lute was learning
To echo from thy voice, stay with me still!
Once flown—alas! for thee there's no returning!
The charm will die o'er valley, wood and hill.
Tell me not Time, whose wing my brow has shaded,
Has wither'd Spring's sweet bloom within my heart;
Ah, no! the rose of love is yet unfaded,
Though hope and joy, its sister flowers, depart.
Well do I know that I have wrong'd thine altar,
With the light offerings of an idler's mind,
And thus, with shame, my pleading prayer I falter,
Leave me not, spirit! deaf, and dumb, and blind!
Deaf to the mystic harmony of nature,
Blind to the beauty of her stars and flowers;
Leave me not, heavenly yet human teacher,
Lonely and lost in this cold world of ours;
Heaven knows I need thy music and thy beauty
Still to beguile me on my dreary way,
To lighten to my soul the cares of duty,
And bless with radiant dreams the darken'd day;
To charm my wild heart in the worldly revel,
Lest I, too, join the aimless, false and vain.
Let me not lower to the soulless level
Of those whom now I pity and disdain!
Leave me not yet!—Leave me not cold and pining,
Thou bird of Paradise, whose plumes of light,
Where'er they rested, left a glory shining—
Fly not to heaven, or let me share thy flight!
After this comes one of her most poetical compositions, "Ermengarde's Awakening," in which, with even more than her usual felicity of diction, she has invested with mortal passion a group from the Pantheon. It is too long to be quoted here, but as an example of her manner upon a similar subject, and in the same rhythm, we copy the poem of "Eurydice:"
With heart that thrill'd to every earnest line,
I had been reading o'er that antique story,
Wherein the youth, half human, half divine,
Of all love-lore the Eidolon and glory,
Child of the Sun, with music's pleading spell,
In Pluto's palace swept, for love, his golden shell!
And in the wild, sweet legend, dimly traced,
My own heart's history unfolded seem'd;
Ah! lost one! by thy lover-minstrel graced
With homage pure as ever woman dreamed,
Too fondly worshipp'd, since such fate befell,
Was it not sweet to die—because beloved too well!
The scene is round me! Throned amid the gloom,
As a flower smiles on Etna's fatal breast,
Young Proserpine beside her lord doth bloom;
And near—of Orpheus' soul, oh, idol blest!—
While low for thee he tunes his lyre of light,
I see thy meek, fair form dawn through that lurid night!
I see the glorious boy—his dark locks wreathing
Wildly the wan and spiritual brow;
His sweet, curved lip the soul of music breathing;
His blue Greek eyes, that speak Love's loyal vow;
I see him bend on thee that eloquent glance,
The while those wondrous notes the realm of terror trance.
I see his face with more than mortal beauty
Kindling, as, armed with that sweet lyre alone,
Pledged to a holy and heroic duty,
He stands serene before the awful throne,
And looks on Hades' horrors with clear eye,
Since thou, his own adored Eurydice, art nigh.
Now soft and low a prelude sweet uprings,
As if a prison'd angel—pleading there
For life and love—were fetter'd 'neath the strings,
And poured his passionate soul upon the air!
Anon it clangs with wild, exulting swell,
Till the full pæan peals triumphantly through Hell.
And thou, thy pale hands meekly lock'd before thee,
Thy sad eyes drinking life from his dear gaze,
Thy lips apart, thy hair a halo o'er thee
Trailing around thy throat its golden maze;
Thus, with all words in passionate silence dying,
Within thy soul I hear Love's eager voice replying: