 | [Poems by Cary in] The poems of Alice and Phoebe Cary with introduction and notes |  |
A LAMENT.
Once in the season of childhood's joy,
Dreaming never of life's great ills,
Hand in hand with a happy boy,
I walked about on my native hills,—
Dreaming never of life's great ills,
Hand in hand with a happy boy,
I walked about on my native hills,—
Gathering berries ripe and fair,
Pressing them oft to his smiling lip,
Braiding flowers in his sunny hair,
And letting the curls through my fingers slip,—
Pressing them oft to his smiling lip,
Braiding flowers in his sunny hair,
And letting the curls through my fingers slip,—
Watching the clouds of the evening pass
Over the moon in her home of blue;
Or chasing fireflies over the grass,
Till our feet were wet with the summer dew.
Over the moon in her home of blue;
Or chasing fireflies over the grass,
Till our feet were wet with the summer dew.
Now I walk on the hills alone,
Dreaming never of hope or joy,
And over a dungeon's floor of stone
Sweep the curls of that happy boy.
Dreaming never of hope or joy,
And over a dungeon's floor of stone
Sweep the curls of that happy boy.
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And every night when a rose-hedge springs
Up from the ashes of sunset's pyre,
And the eve-star, folding her golden wings,
Drops like a bird in the leaves of fire,—
Up from the ashes of sunset's pyre,
And the eve-star, folding her golden wings,
Drops like a bird in the leaves of fire,—
I sit and think how he entered in,
And farther and farther, every time,
Followed the downward way of sin,
Till it led to the awful gates of crime.
And farther and farther, every time,
Followed the downward way of sin,
Till it led to the awful gates of crime.
I sit and think, till my great despair
Rises up like a mighty wave,
How fast the locks of my father's hair
Are whitening now for the quiet grave.
Rises up like a mighty wave,
How fast the locks of my father's hair
Are whitening now for the quiet grave.
But never reproach on my lip has been,
Never one moment can I forget,
Though bound in prison and lost in sin,
My brother once is my brother yet.
Never one moment can I forget,
Though bound in prison and lost in sin,
My brother once is my brother yet.
| [Poems by Cary in] The poems of Alice and Phoebe Cary with introduction and notes | |