THE UNWILLING BRIDE.
I
The joy-bells are ringing—oh! come to the church:
We shall see the bride pass, if we stand in the porch.
The bridegroom is wealthy: how brightly arrayed
Are the menials who wait on the gay cavalcade;
The steeds with the chariots prancing along,
And the peasants advancing with music and song!
II
Now comes the procession: the bridemaids are there,
With white robes, and ribbons, and wreaths in their hair.
Yon feeble old knight the bride's father must be,
And now, walking proudly, her mother we see;
A pale girl in tears slowly moves by her side:
But where is the bridegroom, and where is the bride?
III
They kneel round the altar—the organ has ceased,
The hands of the lovers are joined by the priest;—
That bond, which death only can sever again,
Which proves ever after life's blessing or bane!
A bridal like this is a sorrowful sight:
See! the pale girl is bride to the feeble old knight.
IV
Her hand on her husband's arm passively lies,
And closely she draws her rich veil o'er her eyes;
Her friends throng around her with accents of love:
She speaks not—her pale lips inaudibly move.
Her equipage waits—she is placed by the side
Of her aged companion—a sorrowing bride!
V
Again the bells ring, and the moment is come
For the young heart's worst trial, the last look of home!
They pass from the village—how eagerly still,
She turns and looks back from the brow of the hill!
She sees the white cottage—the garden she made—
And she thinks of her lover, abandoned—betrayed!
VI
But who, with arms folded, hath lingered so long
To watch the procession, apart from the throng?
'Tis he, the forsaken! The false one is gone—
He turns to his desolate dwelling alone;
But happier there than the doom that awaits
The bride, who must smile on a being she hates!
