The last, alas!
of my bright days and glad
—Few have been
mine in this brief life below—
Had come; I felt my heart
as tepid snow,
Presage, perchance, of days
both dark and sad.
As one in nerves, and pulse,
and spirits bad,
Who of some frequent fever
waits the blow,
E’en so I felt—for
how could I foreknow
Such near end of the half-joys
I have had?
Her beauteous eyes, in heaven
now bright and bless’d
With the pure light whence
health and life descends,
(Wretched and beggar’d
leaving me behind,)
With chaste and soul-lit beams
our grief address’d:
“Tarry ye here in peace,
beloved friends,
Though here no more, we yet
shall there be join’d.”
MACGREGOR.
Ah me! the last
of all my happy days
(Not many happy days my years
can show)
Was come! I felt my heart
as turn’d to snow,
Presage, perhaps, that happiness
decays!
E’en as the man whose
shivering frame betrays,
And fluttering pulse, the
ague’s coming blow;
’Twas thus I felt!—but
could I therefore know
How soon would end the bliss
that never stays?
Those eyes that now, in heaven’s
delicious light,
Drink in pure beams which
life and glory rain,
Just as they left mine, blinded,
sunk in night,
Seem’d thus to say,
sparkling unwonted bright,—
“Awhile, beloved friends,
in peace remain,
Oh, we shall yet elsewhere
exchange fond looks again!”
MOREHEAD.
SONNET LVIII.
O giorno, o ora, o ultimo momento.
HE MOURNS HIS WANT OF PERCEPTION AT THAT MEETING.
O Day, O hour,
O moment sweetest, last,
O stars conspired to make
me poor indeed!
O look too true, in which
I seem’d to read.
At parting, that my happiness
was past;
Now my full loss I know, I
feel at last:
Then I believed (ah! weak
and idle creed!)
’Twas but a part alone
I lost; instead,
Was there a hope that flew
not with the blast?
For, even then, it was in
heaven ordain’d
That the sweet light of all
my life should die:
’Twas written in her
sadly-pensive eye!
But mine unconscious of the
truth remain’d;
Or, what it would not see,
to see refrain’d,
That I might sink in sudden
misery!
MOREHEAD.
Dark hour, last
moment of that fatal day!
Stars which to beggar me of
bliss combined!
O faithful glance, too well
which seem’dst to say
Farewell to me, farewell to
peace of mind!
Awaken’d now, my losses
I survey:
Alas! I fondly thought—thoughts
weak and blind!—
That absence would take part,
not all, away;
How many hopes it scatter’d
to the wind.
Heaven had already doom’d
it otherwise,