Fair roses, tulips, pinks, and violets-SHE is the east just ready for the sun All white as cerements of the coffined Upon a cloudless morning. Ch, dead; her cheek As I moaned "Mother!" yesterday, I shall not find some gracious way, Of comforting my little May! If, when you kiss my silent lips, They will not pass from death's eclipse To smile in peace I then shall know,. If my poor children's grief will fail. Oh! patient hands, that toil to keep And thrill with mother happiness; Have they not soon the power to bless? I think the sting of death must be HIRAM RICH. STILL TENANTED. OLD house, how desolate thy life! Nay, life and death alike have fled; Nor thrift, nor anv song within, Nor daily thought for daily bread. The dew is nightly on thy hearth. Yet something sweeter to thee clings, And some who enter think they hear The murmur of departing wings. No doubt within the chambers there, Not by the wall nor through the gate. Uncounted tenants come, to whom The house is not so desolate.. COME, come, come, my love, come and hurry, and come, my dear; For love of you has burned me through has oped a gap for Death, I fear; Though angels' swords should bar your way, turn you not back, but persevere; Though heaven should send down fiery hail, rain lightnings, do not fear; Let your small, exquisite, white feet fly over cliffs and mountains sheer, Bridge rivers, scatter armèd foes, shine on the hill-tops near. Like citizens to greet their queen, then shall my hopes, desires, troop out, To speed, to urge, to lift you on, 'mid storms of joy and floods of tears, 'The javelin-scourges of your eye, the lightnings from your glorious face, Shall drive away Death's armies gray in ruin and disgrace. Lift me you shall, and succor me; my ancient courage vou shall rouse, Then, hand in hand, we'll laugh at Death, his brainless skull, his nerveless arm; How can he wreak our overthrow, or plot, to do us harm? For what so weak a thing as Death when you are near, when you are near? Oh, come, come, come, my love, before his hand is here! ERNEST W. SHURTLEFF. OUT OF THE DARK. DAY like a flower blossoms from the night, And all things beautiful arise from things That bear a lesser grace. The lily springs Pure as an angel's soul, and just as white, From out the dark clod where no ray of light E'er creeps. The butterfly, on airy wings, Rises from the cold chrysalis that clings To some dead, mouldering leaflet, hid from sight. If thus in nature all things good and fair, And all things that the grace of beauty wear, Begotten are of things that hold no charm, Then will I seek to find in every care, And every sorrow, and in all the harm That comes to me, a pleasure sweet and rare. |