 | The high-top sweeting And Other Poems |  |
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A FORSAKEN FAVORITE.
This world has many types of loneliness:
The last leaf, fluttering in November's gale;
A widowed bird, that sits and calls in vain;
The empty chair of one we used to love;
A lighthouse beacon on a stormy night;
A vacant bird-cage, whence the song has died;
An autumn rose upon its frosty brier;
A sea-gull, floating in the winter sky;
A sweetheart waiting for a recreant love;
A late star, twinkling faintly into day;
A ship alone upon the trackless sea;
A butterfly, belated in a frost;
A baby's grave upon a western trail;
A ruined homestead, shone on by the moon.
The last leaf, fluttering in November's gale;
A widowed bird, that sits and calls in vain;
The empty chair of one we used to love;
A lighthouse beacon on a stormy night;
A vacant bird-cage, whence the song has died;
An autumn rose upon its frosty brier;
A sea-gull, floating in the winter sky;
A sweetheart waiting for a recreant love;
A late star, twinkling faintly into day;
A ship alone upon the trackless sea;
A butterfly, belated in a frost;
A baby's grave upon a western trail;
A ruined homestead, shone on by the moon.
Yet none seems drearier than the household pet
Once welcomed to the warmest fireside place,
A purring, proud, luxurious favorite,
Which haunts, at evening of a wintry day,
The doorstep of a house untenanted,
From which her false, forgetful friends have gone,
Leaving her homeless, hungry, and forlorn.
Vainly she waits the care she used to know,
The children's call, the evening's milky feast,
The gentle hand that smoothed her furry sides;
Raises alternately her patient feet,
Benumbed and aching, from the icy stone,
Watches the shuttered windows piteously,
And mews, despairing, at the bolted door.
Once welcomed to the warmest fireside place,
A purring, proud, luxurious favorite,
Which haunts, at evening of a wintry day,
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From which her false, forgetful friends have gone,
Leaving her homeless, hungry, and forlorn.
Vainly she waits the care she used to know,
The children's call, the evening's milky feast,
The gentle hand that smoothed her furry sides;
Raises alternately her patient feet,
Benumbed and aching, from the icy stone,
Watches the shuttered windows piteously,
And mews, despairing, at the bolted door.
| The high-top sweeting And Other Poems | |