Ill fares the heart, when hope has fled;
  That heart is as some ruin old,
With ancient arch and wall, o’erspread
  With moss, and desolating mold;
Whose banquet halls, where once the sound
  Of revelry rang unconfined,
Now, with the hoot of owls resound,
  Or echo back the mournful wind;
In whose foul nooks the gruesome bat is found. 
  The heart a ruin is, when unresigned;
  No hope before, and but regret behind.

[Illustration: 
“Its noble form magnificent and proud,
  Doth prostrate lie, nor ever riseth more.”

Ironton Park, Ouray county, Colorado.]

Ill fares the heart, when hope has fled;
  That heart, to fate unreconciled,
Though throbbing, is as truly dead
  As though by foul decay defiled;
That heart is as a grinning skull,
  With smiling mockery, and stare
Of eyeless sockets, or the hull
  Of shipwrecked vessel, bleached and bare,
Derelict, morbid, apathetic, dull,
  As drowning men, who clutch the empty air,
  The heart goes down, which feels but blind despair.

Hidden Sorrows.

For some the river of life would seem
  Free from the shallow, the reef, or bar,
As they gently glide down the silvery stream
  With scarcely a ripple, a lurch, or jar;
But under the surface, calm and fair,
  Lurk the hidden snags, and the secret care;
The waters are deepest where still, and clear,
And the sternest anguish forbids a tear.

For others, the pathway of life is strewn
  With many a thorn, for each rose or bud;
And their journey o’er mountain, o’er moor, and dune,
  Can be plainly tracked by footprints of blood;
But deeper still lies the hidden smart
  Of some secret sorrow, which gnaws the heart,
And rankles under a surface clear;
For the sternest anguish forbids a tear.

But, when the journey’s end we see,
  At the bar of the Judge of quick and dead,
The cross, which the one bore silently
May outweigh his of the bloodstained tread. 
The cross unseen, and the cross of light,
  May balance in that Judge’s sight;
O’er the heart that is breaking a smile may appear,
For the sternest anguish forbids a tear.

O, a Beautiful Thing Is the Flower That Fadeth!

O, a beautiful thing is the flower that fadeth,
  And perishing, smiles on the chill autumn wind;
A sweet desolation its ruin pervadeth,
  A fragrant remembrance still lingers behind.

O, a beautiful thing is the glad consummation
  Of a life that is upright, untarnished and pure;
That spirit, when freed from this earth’s animation,
  Shall live, as the heavens eternal endure!

Smiles.

There is the warm, congenial smile,
  Benign, and honest, too,
Free from deception, fraud, and guile;
  The smile of friendship true.

There is the smile most fair to see,
Which wreathes the modest glance
Of spotless maiden purity;
  The smile of innocence.