Sad and cheerless stands the homestead
In its grandeur as of old;
’Tis a casket--lost, the jewel;
’Tis a mine without its gold.
Once a sunbeam at the doorway
Gilded room and gladdened hall;
Making life a golden summer,
Full of joy for each and all.
But the sunshine that has vanished
Ne’er can brighten o’er us more,
Though I bow in meek submission
Yet my heart is sad and sore.
I have lost my life’s sweet treasure,
Earth holds nothing dear for me;
“Upward, onward,” be my motto,
Onward, upward, still to thee.
Hallie! be my guarding angel,
Teach my footsteps not to stray;
Spread your sainted wings above me,
Lead me in “the narrow way,”
So that you can come and meet me--
Waft me heavenward on your breast,
“Where the wicked cease from troubling,
And the weary are at rest.”
I’ve Asked You to Forget Me.
I’ve asked you to forget me,
To let our happy past
Ne’er be recalled; for ah! it was
Too sweet, too bright! to last.
But yet you say that you’re my friend,
And still as fond and true;
While I ne’er care to see thy face,
Or have one thought of you.
Then ne’er again recall those days
When roguish Cupid played
At twining garlands ’round our hearts
Only to wilt and fade;
For I have with a steady hand,
Not heeding Love’s sweet art,
Unwound them from their resting place
And freed your faithless heart.
Little Blanche.
Gather up the broken playthings,
Scattered on the nursery floor;
Blanche is gone!--her little fingers
Ne’er will fondle with them more.
Hide away the dolls, the dishes--
Precious treasures! O! so dear!
Lay aside the little dresses--
In each fold a mother’s tear.
God hath given--God hath taken,
Though it rends the heart in twain,
He but sends his frowns upon us,
To give back his smiles again.
She hath gone to ’wait your coming,
Smiling where the angels stand;
Lingering there at heaven’s gateway,
That she first may clasp your hand.
The Little Front Gate.
Away from the world and its bustle,
When the daylight grows pleasant and late;
In our own cosy cot, I am waiting
For the slam of the little front gate.
The birds at the doorway are singing,
The roses their beauty debate;
But I sit here alone, and I listen
For the slam of the little front gate.
Sometimes, ere the shadows of twilight
Send the roving bird home to its mate,
I list for a hurrying footstep,
And the slam of the little front gate.
O! you who are burdened with sorrow,
And believe that life is but fate,
Learn from me there is joy in waiting
For the slam of the little front gate.
Drifting.
Scotta, you are drifting from me,
O’er the billows of life’s tide;
You and I have sailed together,
With our frail barks side by side.
You are drifting with the current,
But my feeble oar is light,
Too light to follow; and, in anguish,
I must watch you drift from sight.
Drifting, gliding, moving onward,
Tide and sky seem one deep blue;
All in vain my eyes are yearning,
You have drifted from my view.
But there’s yet a broader current,
Where our meeting barks will land;
You and I still bound together,
Heart to heart, and hand to hand.
Looking Back.
She opened a little worn package,
Scarred yellow by Time’s ruthless hand;
Disclosing a bundle of letters
Tied up with a pale ribbon band.
“These,” she said, “are like leaves from a fernery,
Long pressed in a book with a flower;
And the memories wafted up from them,
Like perfume that follows a shower.
“With no wormwood or gall in the essence,
Few tares in life’s garden were sown;
The clouds partly hiding the sunshine,
Some weeds with the blossoms have grown.
“But we loved”--here she held out a picture;
A tear-drop was dimming her eye,
As a cloud will o’ershadow the landscape,
Or shut out a star in the sky.
I took up a ring and a locket,
Set deep with a ruby and pearl;
The clasp was all tarnished and broken,
And tear-stained the face of the girl,
Whose eyes were awake in Hope’s morning,
Love kindled their depths with his spark--
Even then, from the red velvet lining,
They glowed like a gem in the dark.
I turned to the sad little figure,
’Round the package the faded cord tied;
Pressed my lips to her cheek--ah, how sadly
The roses had bloomed there and died.
Long we sat in the lingering twilight,
Looking back o’er the vanishing years;
She sobbed out her grief on my bosom,
And moistened my brow with her tears.
What comfort in words could I offer?
There was more in a soul-telling glance;
For each heart hath its season of springtime,
Each heart hath a buried romance.
Scotta.
I Saw her last night in a vision
(How often she comes when I dream!)
Through the garden of Heaven she loitered,
Then stood by a clear, placid stream.
And out of the heart of the river
A bunch of white lilies she drew,
I scarce could discern from the blossoms
Her fingers, so waxen their hue.
But her face wore the same quiet features,
And her smile was enhancing the light
That fell on this friend of my bosom,
This angel robed softly in white.
I longed to reach upward and touch her,
To ask why the flowers she twined;
Wondered often for whom was the garland,
And the crown with the lily buds lined.
So I cried and my voice soared onward
Farther than sight could extend--
“For whom are you weaving this chaplet?
Speak, Scotta! sweet spirit and friend.”
“O! tell me just why from the portals
Of Heaven you’ve wandered away,
And sit here alone by the river
Wreathing these lilies to-day.”
Her lips parted, as if for an answer--
Then a cluster of cherubim, came--
They hovered about this sweet seraph,
And whispered in concert _a name_.
It resounded along Heaven’s archway,
But soft on my ear that word fell,
Soft as her accents of friendship,
Soft as a Sabbath eve bell.
And the dewdrops and spray of the river
On the garlands to crystals had turned,
The crown she embedded with snow-drops,
One jewel there glittered and burned.
Its luster was brilliant and sunlike,
As burnished as those in the throne,
But the name that her own gentle fingers
Had carved there, ah! me, was--_my own_.
And what if Life’s thorns pressed my temples
Or sorrow to midnight turns day,
I will press on alone through the darkness,
Believing her hand leads the way.
I will traverse the chill “Swamp of Cypress”
Where the “Rivers of Death” slowly wind;
For she’ll beckon me over with garlands,
And the crown with the lily buds lined.
The Lover and Flower.
I found it, one day, in a pretty shade
Which a vine and a maple together made;
’Twas blooming away in a dress of white,
With eyes of a blue transparent light.
I knelt at its shrine,
And this heart of mine
Drank in the fragrance as one drinks wine.
Then I said, “Sweet flower, this cooling shade
With the summer weather will dim and fade,
There’s a place in my heart--a cozy room--
Where you may nestle and grow and bloom.”
Thus I wooed the flower,
In this shady bower,
And lovers we were that self-same hour.
I carried it home, I pruned it with care,
I gave it the sun and the morning air.
The honey bees came its dew to sip,
But I drove them away with pouting lip;
For I loved my flower,
And with jealous power
I banished the bees from our curtained bower.
A butterfly came on wings of lace,
And tried to fan my blossom’s face;
But I brushed it away with cruel hands,
And tore from its wings the velvet bands;
Then I kissed my flower;
But a summer shower
Burst from the clouds with mesmeric power.
Then the pale little blossom heaved a sigh,
And opened a blue and timid eye
To thank the cloud as it did in the shade,
Which the vine and the maple together made;
But my heart would rebel;
I could not quell
Its raging fire--it seemed from hell.
I slammed the shutters with curses of doom;
I made it dark as a dungeon room,
Then I hurried away like a thief in the night;
But I strolled again in the warm sunlight,
And another flower
From Fashion’s own bower
I culled, and nursed it only an hour.
It proved but a weed with a gaudy bloom,
And a poisonous odor filled my room.
So I turned once more to my wildwood flower,
That I locked in my heart that sinful hour,
When the angel of love,
To its mansion above,
Had fluttered away like a wounded dove.
How softly I turned the key in my heart;
One moment I faltered--the door swung apart--
A faint, sweet essence, like heliotrope bloom,
Was sick’ning my senses; I moved through the room
With a staggering tread,
With a brain reeling head,
And swooned there--_a murd’rer_--my flower was--_dead_.
My Cloud--To Scotta.
There’s a cloud on my life’s horizon
Of wonderful shape and hue,
Like the feathery down of a snow-drift
’Tis dimpled with changeful blue.
I gaze on its shadowy outline
And drink in the calm of the skies,
Till I fancy it floats out of heaven,
As an angel in disguise.
No slumbering storm in its bosom,
No hint of the lightning’s glare,
Only a feast for the heart and soul
Is this treasure of the air;
For I know from its silvery edges,
And glimpses of hidden gold,
That a picture of rare tranquility
Its tender depths enfold.
Else whence is this mystic feeling
Of peace that’s stealing o’er me?
Like the magic of summer moonlight
Enchanting a restless sea.
O! heavenly cloud! why are you
So calm? so angelic you seem,
My spirit escapes in its longing--
I am lost in a beautiful dream.
Up, up on the wings of a swallow
Piercing the heaven’s deep blue,
O’er meadow and mount I am rising,
And floating, sweet spirit, to you;
Onward, in trance I am wafted,
Now into the cloudlet above;
And a face smiles out from its drapery,
And ah! ’tis a face that I love.
The Decision.
A dispute once arose in a bee-hive
As to which of the little brown bees
Could gather the sweetest nectar
From blossoms or budding trees.
The queen tried in vain to discover
Some method the riot to quell;
But a challenge for war had been sounded,
And threatened was each honey cell.
So she spoke in a voice most persuasive--
“He shall sit on my throne for an hour,
Who brings from the store-house of nature,
The juice of the sweetest-lipped flower.”
Away flew the brown little workers,
Away out of sight o’er the hill;
Then backward and forward they flitted,
The honey-cups eager to fill.
One famished the heart of a lily,
And drank from its milky bud;
One opened the vein of a rose leaf,
And licked up the crimson blood.
To a poppy-bed still one hurried,
On a downy cot he crept,
But all-day in the silken blankets,
Unconscious there he slept.
Another flew off to the meadow,
And punctured the daisy’s cap;
A swarm had encompassed a fountain,
Where gurgled the sugar-tree sap.
A fourth and a fifth to a mansion
Had followed a bridal pair;
One strangled the bud on her bosom,
One mangled the wreath on her hair.
But the sixth one paused at a cottage,
Where a sick girl sleeping lay;
And there by the open window,
Blossomed a hyacinth spray.
A youth stood near in the shadows,
And watching the dreamer’s face,
A tear rolled down from his eyelid
And fell on the hyacinth vase.
It was only the work of a moment
For a busy bee to do,
To flavor affections tear-drop
With the extract, “flower-dew.”
So he gathered this precious honey,
And, polishing up his sting,
He flitted out of the window,
With gold dust under his wing.
Such a night in the little bee-hive
Before was never known;
For the hyacinth’s rich moist pollen
Had paved the way to the throne.
Autumn.
Who is it that paints the woodlands
Like a gorgeous gown of gold;
Dropping, here and there, a ripple
Of vermilion in each fold?
Who is it that calls the robins
And the blackbirds into bands;
Pointing them with flaming fingers,
To the sunny, Southern lands?
What has scorched the tender blossoms?
In our yards they’re dying now.
Do you know who kissed the apple
Till it reddened on the bough?
Why so mute the little streamlet?
Down the hill it used to leap;
Now I faintly hear it sobbing--
Sobbing out like one in sleep.
Leaden clouds lay on the heavens,
Like a burden on the heart;
And the winds together whisper,
Sad as loved ones ere they part.
Then anon a dreamy dullness
Hovers over sky and earth;
Ah! my soul reflects the sadness,
And I seek my friendly hearth.
You who love the Indian summer,
So renowned by pen and art,
Go, and revel in the gloaming,
While so sadly pants my heart.
But I can not watch the leaflets,
On the whirlwind as they ride,
For just so a hectic river
Bore my darling from my side.
A Sister’s Love.