Dirge.

DIRGE.

I.

I SAW the pine trees on the shore
Stand solemn in their dark green shroud,
I heard the winds thy loss deplore,
Whose beauty worlds had fleetly bowed.

Thy beauty! God’s own hand did press
Thy rich curls round thy Grecian brow,
And wound thee in lithe loveliness;—
I see thee standing by me now.

I hear thy solemn anthem fall
Of richest song upon my ear,
That clothes thee in thy golden pall,
As this wide sun flows on the mere.

Away—‘tis autumn in the land,
Though summer decks the green pine’s bough,
Its spires are plucked by thy while hand,
I see thee standing by me now.

II.

I dress thee in the withered leaves,
Like forests when their day is done,
I bear thee, as the wain its sheaves,
Which crisply rustle in the sun.

Thou trackest me as blood-hounds scent
The wanderer’s feet all down the glen;
Thy memory is the monument
That dies not out my heart again.

So swift the circling years run round
Their dizzy course, I hope to hide;
But till they lay me ‘neath the ground,
My resting day shall be denied.

Thou, summer sun, wilt pity me,
Thy beams once gladly sought my brow,
My love, I wandered then with thee,—
I see thee standing by me now.

III.

A thousand flowers enchant the gale
With perfume sweet as love’s first kiss,
And odours in the landscape sail,
That charm the sense with sudden bliss.

But fate, who metes a different way
To me, since I was falsely sold,
Hath gray-haired turned the sunny day,
Bent its high form and made it old.

Age freezes me on every side,
Since thy sweet beauty died to me,
And I had better youthful died,
Than broke such loving troth to thee.

I see the hills where heaven stoops
To seize the shadows off their brow,
But there my nature downward droops,—
I see thee standing by me now.

IV.

Come time—come death, and blot my doom
With feller woes, if they be thine,
Clang back thy gates, sepulchral tomb,
And match thy barrenness with mine.

O! moaning wind along the shore,
How faint thy sobbing accents come!
Strike on my heart with maddest roar,
Thou meet’st no discord in this home

Sear, blistering sun, these temple veins,
Blind, icy moon, these coldest eyes,
And drench me through, you winter rains,—
Swell, if ye can, my miseries.

Those dark, deep orbs are meeting mine,
That white hand presses on my brow,
That soft, sweet smile I know, ‘t is thine,—
I see thee standing by me now.