All lovely and bright, 'mid the desert of time,
Seem the days when I wander'd with you,
Like the green isles that swell in this far distant clime,
On the deeps that are trackless and blue.
And now, while the torrent is loud on the hill,
And the howl of the forest is drear,
I think of the lapse of our own native rill--
I think of thy voice with a tear.
The light of my taper is fading away,
It hovers, and trembles, and dies;
The far-coming morn on her sea-paths is gray,
But sleep will not come to mine eyes.
Yet why should I ponder, or why should I grieve
O'er the joys that my childhood has known?
We may meet, when the dew-flowers are fragrant at eve,
As we met in the days that are gone.