"I was Ever thus ! _ Each hour that came,
Still inoremitting, bought
Some newer form of guit
care for thought.
M. Gilmore hims
POEMS OF PARTING AND ABSENCE.
When fell the night, up sprang the breeze,
And all the darkling hours they plied;
Nor dreamt but each the selfsame seas
By each was cleaving, side by side:
E'en so
but why the tale reveal Of those whom, year by year unchanged, Brief absence joined anew, to feel,
Astounded, soul from soul estranged?
At dead of night their sails were filled,
And onward each rejoicing steered;
Ah! neither blame, for neither willed
Or wist what first with dawn appeared.
To veer, how vain! On, onward strain,
Brave barks!-in light, in darkness too!
Through winds and tides one compass guides:
To that and your own selves be true.
But O blithe breeze! and O great seas!
Though ne'er that earliest parting past,
On your wide plain they join again,
Together lead them home at last.
THE kiss, dear maid! thy lip has left
Shall never part from mine,
Till happier hours restore the gift
Untainted back to thine.
Thy parting glance, which fondly beams, An equal love may see:
The tear that from thine eyelid streams Can weep no change in me.
I ask no pledge to make me blest
In gazing when alone;
Nor one memorial for a breast
Whose thoughts are all thine own.
Nor need I write to tell the tale
My pen were doubly weak:
O, what can idle words avail,
Unless the heart could speak?
THE HEATH THIS NIGHT MUST BE MY BED.
SONG OF THE YOUNG HIGHLANDER, SUMMONED FROM THE
SIDE OF HIS BRIDE BY THE "FIERY CROSS" OF ROD-
BRICK DHU.
THE heath this night must be my bed,
The bracken curtain for my head,
My lullaby the warder's tread,
Far, far from love and thee, Mary;
To-morrow eve, more stilly laid,
My couch may be my bloody plaid,
My vesper song, thy wail, sweet maid!
It will not waken me, Mary!
I may not, dare not, fancy now
The grief that clouds thy lovely brow,
I dare not think upon thy vow,
And all it promised me, Mary.
• Zoë mou, sas agapo, - My life, I love thee.
|