University of Virginia Library

THE PARTING.

We parted in a sweet and touching hour
Of dreamy influence, and of deepening power;
The evening's hour of beauty and of rest—
When Earth is garbed as in a Heavenly Vest!
We parted—but my heart—my fervent heart—
Ere thou and thy deep memories so can part—
Thou must be cold, and still, and crushed, and dead—
Thou that hast lived and loved, and ached and bled!
Round these fond memories, each despair's dark spring—
My heart's coiled fibres to the last will cling!
We parted in a Sweet and Sacred hour—
Rich Summer laughed o'er every leafy bower;
And tender Evening reigned with gentlest sway—
And Daylight beautifully died away!
Summer is here again! and all around
With fresh and fairy Loveliness is crowned.
She reigns—her Reign the glad Earth proudly owns,
With all her breezy triumphs—her glad tones:
Her sounds of Singing Waters, clear and free,
And all her fair shows of festivity;
The birds, the song of birds—how doth it float
Through the sweet air, note intertwined with note;
No rainbowed shell's maze hollowed wreathings close,
All delicately tinged with blushful rose,
More complex to the observant eye appear
Than those mixed melodies unto the ear.
She reigns in Beauty—but to me her reign
Can bring but Memories fraught with torturing pain;
And Evening reigns too with her tender sway,
And dies the Day with beautiful Decay;
For even Decay is beautiful and fair,
Most exquisite and softly lovely there,
Where fades the light by delicate degrees,
And even the dimly gathering gloom can please.
Still some things sorrowful are lovely too,
And gently seem our fond regard to woo;
The nightingale doth mourn with loveliest note—
Sweet the sad music of her throbbing throat—
A precious and a rich and crowning strain,
Though telling such deep tales of passionate Pain;
And dear is gentle Evening's soft decline,
More dear than suns when in full blaze they shine;
And the slow death of many-sparkling Light
Is still a mournfully enchanting sight!
Yes! there may be some things—a precious few,
Both sorrowful and deeply lovely too;
But not of such the Heart's harsh love-born grief,
Dark—dread—without repose—without relief!
The lesser griefs of life may sometimes wear
A tender charm—an aspect mild and fair,
And then the aspiring Mind, still buoyed by Hope,
And by too many dream-world's girt to droop,
Many even its Sorrows pleasingly convert
To something like delight—unharmed, unhurt;
But not among Life's lesser griefs can be
Wronged, injured Love's o'erwhelming Misery!
Existence then is bound as with a chain
Of infinite and desolating Pain;
Nor shall that chain its galling links unwind
From the choaked thoughts, and from the tortured mind!
True, though it should not be from fetters freed,
Within the mind may a stern calm succeed
To poignant agony and piercing grief,
But still that calm, it scarce can be relief,
Like some dark sullen Sea, then lies that Mind—
And oh! the sweeping thunders of the wind—
The Spray—the Storm—the Struggle—and the Strife,
Are better than that gloomy Death in Life—
That heavy calm—that deep and dreadful gloom—
That dull and sombre silence of the tomb.
'Tis Evening now, and it was Evening then,
When we two parted—not to meet again;
But now comes slowly on—in deepening Might
The proud, and regal, and victorious Night,
In all her awful Dignity Supreme
She comes, and Earth is wrapt in one soft Dream.
Oh! Mysteries of thick Darkness—deep as Doom,
Magnificence of Majesty of Gloom!
Her dusky, cloudy, old Magnificence,
Her solemn Pomp, even awfully intense!—
How do they smite the strongly-ruffled Soul,
While gorgeous Dream-clouds through its Silence roll;
And nobly, proudly then it makes its own
The untouched, the unseen, the unfathomed, and the unknown;
This pleasure still is mine! though all but this
Of Earth's enjoyments and of feeling's bliss,
Must be to me for evermore denied—
This still is mine, with loftiest thoughts allied.
Hope, Hope and Happiness—to both farewell—
With both, in brighter days, 'twas mine to dwell,
From both 'tis now my gloomy fate to fly,
And wrapt in thoughts of these bright days to sigh.
Oh, Hope! thou Dream! whose Scenes but Shadows are,
Oh, Happiness! thou ever falling Star!
To both farewell—a late but long farewell—
Rent is the chain and broken is the spell!
But feeling still is mine—though this can be
Henceforth but sorrow and despondency;
Yet welcome be its wretchedness and woe,
Still let my Soul's deep fountains freely flow!
The wretch who, sunk in apathetic Peace,
Finds these keen torments, these sharp suff'rings cease,
Who languidly exists, who coldly breathes,
Escapes a thousand pangs, a thousand deaths;
But better these than such a lifeless Life,
Oh! better all the Agonies of Strife—
The acute Anxieties—the poignant Pain—
Than such stagnation of the Heart and Brain!
We parted in a sweet and solemn hour
Of dreamy influence and of deepest power—
We parted—we are parted—and 'tis o'er—
And all—once all to me—can be no more!