WRITTEN BENEATH A PICTURE.

1.

DEAR object of defeated care!

Though now of Love and thee bereft,

To reconcile me with despair
Thine image and my tears are left.

2.

'Tis said with Sorrow Time can cope;

But this I feel can ne'er be true: For by the death-blow of my Hope My Memory immortal grew.

ON PARTING.

1.

THE kiss, dear maid! thy lip has left,
Shall never part from mine,

Till happier hours restore the gift

Untainted back to thine.

2.

Thy parting glance, which fondly beams, An equal love may see:

The tear that from thine eyelid streams

Can weep no change in me.

3.

I ask no pledge to make me blest
In gazing when alone;

Nor one memorial for a breast,

Whose thoughts are all thine own.

4.

Nor need I write-to tell the tale
My pen were doubly weak:
Oh! what can idle words avail,
Unless the heart could speak?

5.

By day or night, in weal or wo,
That heart, no longer free,

Must bear the love it cannot show,

And silent ache for thee.

TO THYRZA.

WITHOUT a stone to mark the spot,

And say, what Truth might well have said, By all, save one, perchance forgot,

Ah, wherefore art thou lowly laid?
By many a shore and many a sea
Divided, yet beloved in vain;
The past, the future fled to thee

To bid us meet-no-ne'er again!
Could this have been-a word, a look
That softly said, "We part in peace,"
Had taught my bosom how to brook,
With fainter sighs, thy soul's release.
And didst thou not, since Death for thee
Prepared a light and pangless dart,
Once long for him thou ne'er shalt see,
Who held, and holds thee in his heart?
Oh! who like him had watch'd thee here?
Or sadly mark'd thy glazing eye,
In that dread hour ere death appear,
When silent Sorrow fears to sigh,
Till all was past? But when no more
"Twas thine to reck of human wo,
Affection's heart-drops, gushing o'er,
Had flow'd as fast-as now they flow.

Shall they not flow, when many a day
In these, to me, deserted towers,
Ere call'd but for a time away,

Affection's mingling tears were ours?
Ours too the glance none saw beside;
The smile none else might understand;
The whisper'd thought of hearts allied,
The pressure of the thrilling hand;
The kiss so guiltless and refined

That Love each warmer wish forbore; Those eyes proclaim'd so pure a mind, Even passion blush'd to plead for more. The tone, that taught me to rejoice, When prone, unlike thee, to repine; The song, celestial from thy voice,

But sweet to me from none but thine; The pledge we wore I wear it still, But where is thine?-ah, where art thou? Oft have I borne the weight of ill,

But never bent beneath till now!

Well hast thou left in life's best bloom
The cup of wo for me to drain.
If rest alone be in the tomb,

I would not wish thee here again;
But if in worlds more blest than this
Thy virtues seek a fitter sphere,
Impart some portion of thy bliss,

To wean me from mine anguish here.

Teach me too early taught by thee!
To bear, forgiving and forgiven:
On earth thy love was such to me;
It fain would form my hope in heaven!

STANZAS.

1.

AWAY, away, ye notes of wo!

Be silent thou once soothing strain,
Or I must flee from hence, for, oh!

I dare not trust those sounds again.
To me they speak of brighter days-
But lull the chords, for now, alas!
I must not think, I may not gaze
On what I am, on what I was.

2.

The voice that made those sounds more sweet
Is hush'd, and all their charms are fled;
And now their softest notes repeat
A dirge, an anthem o'er the dead!
Yes, Thyrza! yes, they breathe of thee,
Beloved dust! since dust thou art;

And all that once was harmony

Is worse than discord to my heart!