Reuben and Other Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

From Edward, and it comes to say farewell!
I scarce dare open it, for every line
I know is writ in tears—tears which a word
Had dried up in their cells ere they were shed,
That word had I but spoken.

(Reads.)

“Thanks to the tides, or to the moon who sways them, I shall see you once again before I sail. It will be the day after to-morrow before we can float. O, Eliza! bethink you seriously of our last interview. You sent me away with my soul toss'd on a sea of uncertainty. Heaven sends me one opportunity more. Be prepared to decide my fate for ever. On you it depends, whether I return in two short years, prosperous and happy, or find a home—perchance a grave—on some barbarous shore. My soul knows but one haven of refuge, and that is your breast. Let me depart in the divine trust that to it I may freely return. To-morrow evening I will be with you. Edward.”

I would the moon—
That most capricious mistress of the tides—
Had been more constant, or the calendar

That registers her vows, been more precise.
'Tis but to lacerate a closing wound,
Meeting so soon again, merely to part:
Though, if my heart were not constrain'd to love
Another more than him, I'd welcome him
To thrice as many meetings. For, in sooth,
I know not why he should not be sole lord
Of all my future hopes, but for this thing
That riots in my heart—this other love.

God speaks with many voices, and we dare
Not violate his word, and hope to thrive.
Conscience oft counsels us to seeming ruin:
Be counsell'd—and behold how great the gain!
So love, though blindly follow'd, leads to bliss
Beyond our poor conception. This my faith,
As well as the sweet luxury it is
To love the other, even in dearth of hope,
Controls me, Edward, and decides thy fate.—
But that need not be fatal! The blue sea
Soon cures a green love-sickness; and black eyes,
Down in the South, soon burn our Nor'land blue
Out of men's thoughts.—Now, what says Jane? I wonder.

“Dearest Eliza,—You often tell me that I owe you twenty visits. Well, this very day I will pay the half of them with one long one. I shall be with you early in the afternoon, and stay until Reuben comes for me. This is to apprise you of my coming, that you may not otherwise dispose of yourself. Meantime, I am, affectionately yours, Jane.”

How like the embodiment of a dream this is!
I half mistrust my eyes! And yet they read
Reuben in good black ink, in Jane's plain hand.
If this be verity, and Reuben comes,
I'll think that all my withering hopes have been
The falling blossoms, heralding the fruit.
My love of him has fed on hopes alone—
Hopes sown within my heart, not by himself,
But by his sister; and this fertile soil,
Together with the rain of many tears,
The sunshine of his presence when I went
On friendly visits, and the dewy winds
Sighing from my own breast, has given my love
Unseemly growth perhaps, since he has been
But passive in his husbandry—the cause,
But not the causer. Yet where'er it grows
In wild uncultured strength, the flower asserts
Its birthright by the fact that it has grown.
So may it be with love. And I have seen
That love and wild-flowers droop, and often die,
When nicely train'd by man. Ah, if thou lov'st
The wild-flowers, Reuben, where they bloom unask'd,
In sunny hedgerows or in quiet woods,
In dingles deep and dusk, or where they dance
In meadows green, and lave in meadow streams,
Come here to-night—here grows the wild-flower love.

[Exit.