Love Letters of a Violinist and Other Poems Part 23

IV.

Will she cling to me as kindly When the childish faith is lost?

Will she pray for me as blindly, Or but weigh the wish and cost, Looking back on our lost Eden from the girlhood she has cross'd?

V.

Oh! I swear by all I honour, By the graves that I endow, By the grace I set upon her, That I meant the early vow,-- Meant it much as men and women mean the same thing spoken now.

VI.

But her maiden troth is broken, And her mind is ill at ease, And she sends me back no token From her home beyond the seas; And I know, though nought is spoken, that she thanks me on her knees.

VII.

Yes, for pardon freely granted; For she wrong'd me, understand.

And my life is disenchanted, As I wander through the land With the sorrows of dark morrows that await me in a band.

VIII.

Hers was sweetest of sweet faces, Hers the tenderest eyes of all!

In her hair she had the traces Of a heavenly coronal, Bringing sunshine to sad places where the sunlight could not fall.

IX.

She was fairer than a vision; Like a vision, too, has flown.

I who flushed at her decision, Lo! I languish here alone; And I tremble when I tell you that my anger was mine own.

X.

Not for her, sweet sainted creature!

Could I curse her to her face?

Could I look on form and feature, And deny the inner grace?

Like a little wax Madonna she was holy in the place.

XI.

And I told her, in mad fashion, That I loved her,--would incline All my life to this one pa.s.sion, And would kneel as at a shrine; And would love her late and early, and would teach her to be mine.

XII.

Now in dreams alone I meet her With my lowly human praise; She is sweeter and completer, And she smiles on me always; But I dare not rise and greet her as I did in early days.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

A MOTHER'S NAME.

I.

I love the sound! The sweetest under Heaven, That name of mother,--and the proudest, too.

As babes we breathe it, and with seven times seven Of youthful prayers, and blessings that accrue, We still repeat the word, with tender steven.

Dearest of friends! dear mother! what we do This side the grave, in purity of aim, Is glorified at last by thy good name.

II.

But how forlorn the word, how full of woe, When she who bears it lies beneath the clod.

In vain the orphan child would call her so,-- She comes not back: her place is up with G.o.d.

The wintry winds are wailing o'er the snow; The flowers are dead that once did grace the sod.

Ah, lose not heart! Some flowers may fade in gloom, But Hope's a plant grows brightest on the tomb!

A SONG OF SERVITUDE.

I.

This is a song of serfs that I have made, A song of sympathy for grief and joy:-- The old, the young, the lov'd and the betrayed, All, all must serve, for all must be obeyed.

II.

There are no tyrants but the serving ones, There are no servants but the ruling men.

The Captain conquers with his army's guns, But he himself is conquered by his sons.

III.

What is a parent but a daughter's slave, A son's retainer when the lad is ill?

The great Creator loves the good and brave, And makes a flower the spokesman of a grave.

IV.

The son is servant in his father's halls, The daughter is her mother's maid-of-work.