The love, the joy that in thy bosom glows,
Lingers to cheer thy friend. From thy fresh dawn
Some golden exhalations have I drawn
To make less dim my dusty noon. Thy tones
Are with me still; some plaintive as the moans
Of Dryads, when their native groves must fall,
Some wildly wailing, like the clarion-call
On battle-field, strewn with the noble dead.
Some in soft romance, like the echoes bred
In the most secret groves of Arcady;
Yet all, wild, sad, or soft, how steeped in poesy!
_Providence, April_, 1888.
* * * * *
TO THE SAME.
_Providence, Oct_. 21, 1888.
* * * * I am reminded by what you say, of an era in my own existence;
it is seven years bygone. For bitter months a heavy weight had been
pressing on me,--the weight of deceived friendship. I could not be
much alone,--a great burden of family cares pressed upon me; I was in
the midst of society, and obliged to act my part there as well as I
could. At that time I took up the study of German, and my progress was
like the rebound of a string pressed almost to bursting. My mind being
then in the highest state of action, heightened, by intellectual
appreciation, every pang; and imagination, by prophetic power, gave to
the painful present all the weight of as painful a future.
Pages:
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412