University of Virginia Library

From “The Minstrel Girl.”—James G. Whittier.

Her lover died. Away from her,
The ocean-girls his requiem sang,
And smoothed his dreamless sepulchre
Where the tall coral branches sprang.
And it was told her how he strove
With death; but not from selfish fear:
It was the memory of her love
Which made existence doubly dear.
They told her how his fevered sleep
Revealed the phantom of his brain—
He thought his love had come to keep
Her vigils at his couch of pain;
And he would speak in his soft tone,
And stretch his arms to clasp the air,
And then awaken with a moan,
And weep that there was nothing there!
And when he bowed himself at last
Beneath the spoiler's cold eclipse,
Even as the weary spirit passed,
Her name was on his marble lips.
She heard the tale; she did not weep;
It was too strangely sad for tears;
And so she kept it for the deep
Rememberings of after years.
She poured one lone and plaintive wail
For the loved dead—it was her last—
Like harp-tones dying, on the gale
Her minstrelsy of spirit passed:
And she became an altered one,
Forgetful of her olden shrine,
As if her darkened soul had done
With all beneath the fair sunshine.