Poems by Frances Sargent Osgood

Leave me not yet! Leave me not cold and lonely,
Thou dear Ideal of my pining heart!
Thou art the friend—the beautiful—the only,
Whom I would keep, though all the world depart!
Thou that dost veil the frailest flower with glory,
Spirit of light and loveliness and truth!
Thou that didst tell me a sweet, fairy story,
Of the dim future, in my wistful youth!
Thou who canst weave a halo round the spirit,
Through which naught mean or evil dare intrude,
Resume not yet the gift, which I inherit
From Heaven and thee, that dearest, holiest good!
Leave me not now! Leave me not cold and lonely,
Thou starry prophet of my pining heart!
Thou art the friend—the tenderest—the only,
With whom, of all, 'twould be despair to part.

Thou that cam'st to me in my dreaming childhood,
Shaping the changeful clouds to pageants rare,

Peopling the smiling vale and shaded wildwood
With airy beings, faint yet strangely fair;
Telling me all the sea-born breeze was saying,
While it went whispering through the willing leaves,
Bidding me listen to the light rain playing
Its pleasant tune about the household eaves;
Tuning the low, sweet ripple of the river,
Till its melodious murmur seem'd a song,
A tender and sad chant, repeated ever,
A sweet, impassion'd plaint of love and wrong!
Leave me not yet! Leave me not cold and lonely,
Thou star of promise o'er my clouded path!
Leave not the life, that borrows from thee only
All of delight and beauty that it hath!

Thou that, when others knew not how to love me,
Nor cared to fathom half my yearning soul,
Didst wreathe thy flowers of light around, above me,
To woo and win me from my grief's control:—
By all my dreams, the passionate and holy,
When thou hast sung love's lullaby to me,
By all the childlike worship, fond and lowly,
Which I have lavish'd upon thine and thee:—
By all the lays my simple lute was learning
To echo from thy voice, stay with me still!
Once flown—alas! for thee there's no returning!

The charm will die o'er valley, wood, and hill.
Tell me not Time, whose wing my brow has shaded,
Has wither'd spring's sweet bloom within my heart;
Ah, no! the rose of love is yet unfaded,
Though hope and joy, its sister flowers, depart.

Well do I know that I have wrong'd thine altar,
With the light offerings of an idler's mind,
And thus, with shame, my pleading prayer I falter,
Leave me not, spirit! deaf, and dumb, and blind!
Deaf to the mystic harmony of nature,
Blind to the beauty of her stars and flowers,
Leave me not, heavenly yet human teacher,
Lonely and lost in this cold world of ours!
Heaven knows I need thy music and thy beauty
Still to beguile me on my weary way,
To lighten to my soul the cares of duty,
And bless with radiant dreams the darken'd day:
To charm my wild heart in the worldly revel,
Lest I, too, join the aimless, false, and vain;
Let me not lower to the soulless level
Of those whom now I pity and disdain!
Leave me not yet!—leave me not cold and pining,
Thou bird of paradise, whose plumes of light,
Where'er they rested, left a glory shining;
Fly not to heaven, or let me share thy flight!

University of Virginia Library

TO THE SPIRIT OF POETRY.