[From _The Poets and Poetry of the West_, edited by W. T.
Coggeshall (Columbus, Ohio, 1860)]
By the dim and fitful firelight
Musing all alone,
Memories of old companions
Dead, or strangers grown;--
Books that we have read together,
Rambles in sweet summer weather,
Thoughts released from earthly tether--
Fancy made my own.
In my cushioned arm-chair sitting
Far into the night,
Sleep, with leaden wings extinguished
All the flickering light;
But, the thoughts that soothed me waking,
Care, and grief, and pain forsaking,
Still the self-same path were taking--
Pilgrims, still in sight.
Indistinct and shadowy phantoms
Of the sacred dead,
Absent faces bending fondly
O'er my drooping head,
In my dreams were woven quaintly,
Dim at first, but calm and saintly,
As the stars that glimmer faintly
From their misty bed.
Presently a lustrous brightness
Eye could scarce behold,
Gave to my enchanted vision
Looks no longer cold,
Features that no clouds encumber,
Forms refreshed by sweetest slumber,
And, of all that blessed number,
Only one was old.
Graceful were they as the willow
By the zephyr stirred!
Bright as childhood when expecting
An approving word!
Fair as when from earth they faded,
Ere the burnished brow was shaded,
Or, the hair with silver braided,
Or lament was heard.
Roundabout in silence moving
Slowly to and fro--
Life-like as I knew and loved them
In their spring-time glow;--
Beaming with a loving luster,
Close, and closer still they cluster
Round my chair that radiant muster,
Just as long ago.
Once, the aged, breathing comfort
O'er my fainting cheek,
Whispered words of precious meaning
Only she could speak;
Scarce could I my rapture smother,
For I knew it was my mother,
And to me there was no other
Saint-like and so meek!
Then the pent-up fount of feeling
Stirred its inmost deep--
Brimming o'er its frozen surface
From its guarded keep,
On my heart its drops descending,
And for one glad moment lending
Dreams of Joy's ecstatic blending,
Blessed my charmèd sleep.
Bright and brighter grew the vision
With each gathering tear,
Till the past was all before me
In its radiance clear;
And again we read at even--
Hoped, beneath the summer heaven,
Hopes that had no bitter leaven,
No disturbing fear.
All so real seemed each presence,
That one word I spoke--
Only one of old endearment
That dead silence broke.
But the angels who were keeping
Stillest watch while I was sleeping,
Left me o'er the embers weeping--
Fled when I awoke.
But, as ivy clings the greenest
On abandoned walls;
And as echo lingers sweetest
In deserted halls:--
Thus, the sunlight that we borrow
From the past to gild our sorrow,
On the dark and dreaded morrow
Like a blessing falls.