And now he is flown and has left me alone
To brood in bereavement and woe,
And I hang like a pall while the rain-drops fall
Like tear-drops steady and slow.
But again he returns when my gloom he discerns,
And subdues his dark spirit of storms;
And the shower descends while the rainbow blends
And the sunshine brightens and warms.
Montreal.
(Written in Winter.)
All clad in rich hiemal robes
By blasts of Boreas plied,
The sovereign City of the North
Sits in majestic pride;
Beside St. Lawrence' noble stream,
Hard by his hidden tide,
She sits, and rears her head aloft
Upon Mount Royal's side.
A crown she wears of richest gems,
Of purest crystal bright,
That sparkle like a maiden's eyes
Which dazzle with delight;
Not gems that glitter best beneath
The courtly lamps by night;
But those whose brilliancy appears
By morning's purer light.
Her sceptre is not mineral
Up-gathered from the dust,
Nor gold, nor silver, long profaned
By man's accursèd lust,
Nor substance base enough to feel
The vitiating rust,
But is a crystalled branch of oak
Just riven by the gust.
"I sit a queen," she proudly says,
"From the Atlantic Main
To where the Rockies to the sky
Their shaggy summits strain,
From where St. Lawrence speeds along
The ocean wave to gain
To where in darkness sleeps the heaven,
Unwaked by Phoebus' wain."