ÆäÀÌÁö À̹ÌÁö
PDF
ePub

Are they gone? can we think it, while thou art there,
Thou radiant child with the clustering hair?

Is it not spring that indeed breathes free

And fresh o'er each thought, as we gaze on thee?

No! never more may we smile as thou
Sheddest round smiles from thy sunny brow!
Yet something it is in our hearts to shrine
A memory of beauty undimmed as thine!

To have met the joy of thy speaking face,
To have felt the spell of thy breezy grace;

To have lingered before thee, and turned, and borne
One vision away of the cloudless morn!

MRS. HEMANS.

CHILDHOOD'S TEAR.

HE tear down Childhood's cheek that flows,
Is like the dewdrop on the rose;
When next the summer breeze comes by,
And waves the bush,—the flower is dry.

SCOTT.

MATERNAL CONSOLATION.

HEN we are sick, where can we turn for succour,
When we are wretched, where can we complain;
And when the world looks cold and surly on us,

Where can we go to meet a warmer eye,
With such sure confidence, as to a Mother?

JOANNA BAILLIE

MY MOTHER.

HEY tell us of an Indian tree,

Which, howsoe'er the sun and sky
May tempt its boughs to wander free,
And shoot, and blossom, wide and high,
Far better loves to bend its arms

Downwards again to that dear earth,
From which the life that fills and warms
Its grateful being, first had birth.
'Tis thus, though wooed by flattering friends,
And fed with fame, (if fame it be),

This heart, my own dear Mother, bends,
With love's true instinct, back to thee.

MOORE,

MY MOTHER.

ND canst thou, Mother, for a moment think,
That we, thy children, when old age shall shed
Its blanching honours on thy weary head,

Could from the best of duties ever shrink?
Sooner the sun from his high sphere should sink
Than we, ungrateful, leave thee in that day,
To pine in solitude thy life away,

Or shun thee, tottering on the grave's cold brink.
Banish the thought!—where'er our steps may roam,
O'er smiling plains, or wastes without a tree,
Still will fond Memory point our hearts to thee,
And paint the pleasures of thy peaceful home;
While duty bids us all thy grief assuage,
And smooth the pillow of thy sinking age.

WHITE

A MOTHER'S GRIEF.

O mark the sufferings of the babe
That cannot speak its woe;

To see the infant tears gush forth,

Yet know not why they flow;

To meet the meek uplifted eye,
That fain would ask relief,
Yet can but tell of agony-
This is a mother's grief.

Through dreary days and darker nights,
To trace the march of death;
To hear the faint and frequent sigh,
The quick and shortened breath;

To watch the last dread strife draw near,
And pray that struggle brief,

Though all

ended with its close

This is a mother's grief!

To see in one short hour, decayed

The hope of future years;

To feel how vain a father's prayers,
How vain a mother's tears,

To think the cold grave now must close
O'er what was once the chief

Of all the treasured joys of earth—
This is a mother's grief!

Yet when the first wild throb is past
Of anguish and despair,

To lift the eye of faith to heaven,
And think, "My child is there!"
This best can dry the gushing tears,
This yields the heart relief;
Until the Christian's pious hope
O'ercomes a mother's grief.

DALE.

[ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]

And not when that dread hour is past,
And life is pain no more—

Not when the dreary tomb is closed

O'er her so loved before;

Not then does kind oblivion come

To lend his woes relief,

But with him to the grave he bears
A father's rooted grief.

For oh! to dry a mother's tears,
Another babe may bloom;
But what remains on earth for him
Whose last is in the tomb?

To think his child is blest above-
To hope their parting brief,—

These, these may soothe-but death alone
Can heal a father's grief.

DALE.

THE FATHER'S BLESSING.

[ocr errors]

"The Lord bless thee, and keep thee."

AY he who erst on Calvary bled,

With all his love, my daughter, bless thee;
Soft dews of mercy o'er thee shed,

Sustain thy soul when woes oppress thee;
May his unfading rays illume

Life's wilderness of guilt and gloom,
Thy star of hope,—thy rock of faith,-
Thy light in darkness,—life in death.
Though clouds invest that awful throne,
No mortal eye may gaze upon,
One kindly beam breaks forth above,
One ray of everlasting love!

On earth 'tis but a meteor streaming,
In heaven a son of glory beaming,

« ÀÌÀü°è¼Ó »