 | Prose sketches and poems |  |
DIRGE,
Over a Companion, buried in the Prairie, July 5th, 1832.
Thy wife shall wait,
Full many a day, for thee;
And when the gate
Turns on its unused hinges, she
Shall ope her grief-contracted eye,
Nor leaving hope to die,
Longingly for thee look,
Till, like some lone and gentle silver brook,
That pineth by the summer heat away,
And dies some day,
She waste her mournful life out at her eyes.
Vainly, ah! vainly we deplore
Thy death, departed friend: no more
Shalt thou enjoy the spirit of known skies;
The barbed arrow hath gone through
Thy fount of life,
And now the veined blue
Hath faded from thy clay-cold cheek, and thou,
With stern and wrinkled brow,
Like one that wrestled mightily with death,
Art lying there.
Whether, above the skies,
Thou treadest heaven's floor, (as was thy creed,)
Beneath God's lightning eyes,
Happy indeed,
(As hope, weak-winged, should ever try to soar,)
Or, buried there,
Taking thy dead, eternal sleep,
Full many a day, for thee;
And when the gate
Turns on its unused hinges, she
Shall ope her grief-contracted eye,
Nor leaving hope to die,
Longingly for thee look,
Till, like some lone and gentle silver brook,
That pineth by the summer heat away,
And dies some day,
She waste her mournful life out at her eyes.
Vainly, ah! vainly we deplore
Thy death, departed friend: no more
Shalt thou enjoy the spirit of known skies;
The barbed arrow hath gone through
Thy fount of life,
And now the veined blue
Hath faded from thy clay-cold cheek, and thou,
With stern and wrinkled brow,
Like one that wrestled mightily with death,
Art lying there.
Whether, above the skies,
Thou treadest heaven's floor, (as was thy creed,)
Beneath God's lightning eyes,
Happy indeed,
(As hope, weak-winged, should ever try to soar,)
Or, buried there,
Taking thy dead, eternal sleep,
166
Shalt only rise in atoms to the air,
(As thinks despair,)—
Howe'er it be, we take our last adieu.
Lie there, pale sleeper!
Lie there! we weep for thee within the heart:
Our fount of grief is deeper,
For that it riseth not into the eyes.
Thy grave is deeper than the wolf can go,
And wheels have rolled above thee; so farewell!
Farewell! for soon,
With sad and solitary tune,
The echo of our voice will leave thy grave.
Again, again,
Farewell!
(As thinks despair,)—
Howe'er it be, we take our last adieu.
Lie there, pale sleeper!
Lie there! we weep for thee within the heart:
Our fount of grief is deeper,
For that it riseth not into the eyes.
Thy grave is deeper than the wolf can go,
And wheels have rolled above thee; so farewell!
Farewell! for soon,
With sad and solitary tune,
The echo of our voice will leave thy grave.
Again, again,
Farewell!
| Prose sketches and poems | |