[GREEN SPOTS IN THE CITY.]
Ye fill my heart with gladness, verdant places,
That 'mid the city greet me as I pass;
Methinks I see of angel steps the traces,
Where'er upon my pathway grows the grass.
I pause before your gates at early morning,
When lies the sward with glittering sheen o'erspread;
And think the dew-drops there each blade adorning,
Are angels' tears for mortal frailty shed.
And ye, earth's firstlings! here in beauty springing,
Erst in your cells by careful winter nursed,
And to the morning heaven your incense flinging,
As at His smile ye forth in joy had burst;
How do ye cheer with hope the lonely hour,
When on my way I tread despondingly;
With thought that He who careth for the flower
Will, in His mercy, still remember me.
Breath of our nostrils, Thou! whose love embraces,
Whose light shall never from our souls depart;
Beneath thy touch hath sprung a green oasis
Amid the arid desert of my heart.
Thy sun and rain awake the bud of promise,
And with fresh leaves in spring-time deck the tree;
That where man's hand hath shut out nature from us,
We by these glimpses may remember Thee.
Mary E. Hewitt.
New-York, June, 1843.
[A DREAM OF CHILDHOOD.]
I dreamed that childhood had returned;
And oh! 't was sweet to roam
Through flowery meads, and birchen groves,
That skirt my lowland home.
Again I chased the butterfly,
And plucked the heather-bell,
And wove a flowery coronal
For one who loved me well.
Again, with bounding step, I ran,
And placed it on his brow;
Again I to the heart was pressed
That's cold and silent now.
I saw with joy the mild eye beam
That never looked unkind;
But with a parent's fondness still
To all my faults was blind.