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Poems

By Edward Quillinan. With a Memoir by William Johnston

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TO D. H.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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TO D. H.

Blithe bird of the wood-nook, thy flight we deplore;
Fair flower of the Green Bank, we see thee no more;
Mild star of the moor-land, where now is thy gleam
That so softly gave light to the lake and the stream?
If a bird be thine emblem, a passage-bird thou;
Those warblers of summer, where carol they now?
They were friends of the summer, from winter they flee,
And the sweet wingèd sylvans have vanish'd like thee.
If a star be thy symbol, yon star in the west,
That peeps in at my casement, resembles thee best:
It haunts me, it sends me a light like a smile,
Yet is distant, alas! and is setting the while.
If a flower be thy type (but where now are the flowers?
Not a bud, scarce a leaf, cheers this winter of ours)

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If a flower be thy type, 'tis the simplest, the dearest,
The bright little primrose, whose advent is nearest:
That flower will I call thee, the herald of spring;
'Twill announce thy return, and the season will bring.
No rose in all England, no lily of France,
Or in summer or spring against thee has a chance:
Such a primrose is worth all the tulips of Holland—
How I envy and hate longitudinal Bolland.