University of Virginia Library

Our village churchyard,—would I could relate
To you all that I think of it, its trees,
Its trailing grass, the hanging stones, that say,
This watch o'er human bones fatigues not us;
My boyhood's fear unsatisfied, for then
I thought a wandering wind some ghostly father,
While the sweet rustle of the locust leaves
Shot a thin crystal web of icy dread
O'er the swift current of my wild heart's blood.
One night the pastor's form among the tombs
Chased the big drops across my unseamed brow.
You smile,—believe me, lesser things than these
Can win a boy's emotions.

These graves,—you mean;
Their history who knows better than I?
For in the busy street strikes on my ear
Each sound, even inaudible voices
Lengthen the long tale my memory tells.
Now mark how reads the epitaph,—“Here lie
Two, who in life were parted, now together.”
I should remember this brief record well.
And yet these two, their lives were much the same
With all who crowd the narrow bridge of life;
I see but little difference, truly;
The greatest yet, is he who still lives on.
Alas! the day seemed big with mighty pains
That laid the first of these within this tomb.
There was within the air a murmuring sound,
For all the summer's life was fluttering o'er,
While the clear autumn conquered, and was glad.
I bore a part of the coffin, and my feet
Scattered the shrouds of the green foliage;
Yellow the flowers nature spread o'er the bier.
You read no names upon this monument;
I could not have them graved; why should we name
So patiently our friends; enough we know them.
Esther her name, and who so gay as she.
Twelve years had gently smoothed the sunny hair
That showered its golden mists adown her neck,
Twelve years,—twelve little years laughed in those eyes
Where, when her mother spoke, the bright drops stood;
So glistened in the spring depths of her love
That parent's image. Joyous was her face,
But yet, below its joy, a larger import;
Even now I see her smile, deep within deep,
And never thoughtless. What a spirited grace
Danced in each bold emotion of her heart
Unshadowed by a fear.

And who the next?—
She came to this still tomb one summer's day;
New flowers were bursting from their unsunned bells
Spring's choristers now fully grown sang loud,
Sweet was the wind, the sky above as blue
As that pure woman's eye we buried then.
Some thirty years had she the footway trod,
Yet frail and delicate she wandered on,
A violet amid the rude world's briars,
Till dropped an icicle within the flower,
That tenderness could not essay to melt.
Her name, and it was Esther;—
This likeness you will trace between the two,
The mother of the young yet sleeping fawn
Was gathered to her side.

My hairs are gray,
Yet those we buried then stood near to me.
Their forms enchant these lonelier, elder years,
And add due sacredness to human life.
That I was father to so fair a child,
And that her mother smiled on me so long,
I think of now as passing gods' estate;
I am enraptured that such lot was mine,
That mine is others. Sleep on, unspotted ones,
Ye are immortal now; your mirthsome hours
Beat in my shrunken pulse, and in mine ears
Sounds the rich music of your heavenly songs.