 | Poems descriptive, dramatic, legendary and contemplative |  |
REPININGS.
“My brother!” said before me a sweet maid,Who look'd a sister's feeling from her eye,
And thereupon I wept;—for I had none,
Brother nor sister—and my way of life
Hath been among the hills, and where the waste,
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Pains the sick eye with gazing. I, alas!
Have known no brother's, felt no sister's love,
Drank fondly of no blessings, such as make
A cottage fireside seem a home like heaven,
Where all is peace and truth. Yet less I've sought
Of love, than of permission but to love,—
The right to choose, from out the hurrying crowd,
My thing of worship. I have none to love—
None for whose single good my heart may hope—
None for whose choice delight my form may rove,
Bringing home dear enjoyments. Mine hath been
The life of want that sister had supplied—
The other self,—most sweet, most singular,
To whom, as to an altar of high thought,
My heart, when otherwise denied, might turn,
Secure of comfort. You may hold it weak
That thus I wept, hearing that maiden call
The youth who stood beside her. Worlds had I given
Had she but call'd me thus. Had she but placed
Her arm upon my own,—look'd in my face
With that dear smile of confidence, and said
“My brother,” I had proudly made her thence
My deity, and she had fill'd my heart,
Its soul and sovereign thence, for evermore!
| Poems descriptive, dramatic, legendary and contemplative | |