University of Virginia Library

Fair stem of many hopes, what wind hath borne
This blight upon thee? What hath chilled thy root,
Turning to ashes all its golden fruit?
Whose holy hand hath cast thee forth to mourn,
An exile from thy paradise, where thou
Hadst plucked the bitter joy which fails thee now,
Like summer promises frost-broken. Sure
The hand that smites thy bosom must be pure;
A snow-shower quenching that ill-fated flame
That hath but burned to tinge thy cheek with shame.
No ruffian death should seize so fair a life,
Bleeding like some pale lamb beneath the knife.
Hath not Love's banquet-board been spread for thee?
And the dark poisoner—say, who is he?
What tale is in thine eyes—each tear a word
That tells such truths as man hath seldom heard.
Oh, it is hard to die by hands which we
Had deemed most gentle, and whose faintest stain
Our purest tears have rendered clear again.
Art thou thus killed! The riches of thy shrine
Are fallen to dust, thou worshipped as divine;
And kneeling there, it did invade thine eye,
Where each sharp grain begets an agony.
Oh, it is burning bitterness to find
Truth on the lip, and meanness in the mind;
To drink from the sweet stream, and then behold
A snake uncurling from the billow's fold.
And here, thy pilot, led thee to the rocks—
Who swore to shield thee from the midday sun;
Who brought a string to bind thy loosened locks,
And so hath strangled the fond heart he won.
What fine-spun threads compose the net, wherein
The mind is taught to suffer ere it sin.
How shall the bird escape the fowler's strings,
Or soar, when selfish craft has stript its wings?

For him the heartless and unhallowed lord
Of the sweet word that waited on his word—
Oh, be his lot to find the fevered shame
Fly far from thee, and darken round his fame!
To range o'er hill and heath, by tempest tost,
And find no blessing like the love he lost.