COME TO ME, DEAREST. 115 Come to me, Dearest. ‘OME to me, dearest, I'm lonely without thee, COME Day-time and night-time, I'm thinking about thee; Unwelcome the waking which ceases to fold thee. Swallows will flit round the desolate ruin, And thoughts of thy love, and its manifold treasure, Figure that moves like a song through the even, Eyes like the skies of poor Erin, our mother, You have been glad when you knew I was gladdened; Come to me, dear, ere I die of my sorrow, Rise on my gloom like the sun of to-morrow; Strong, swift, and fond as the words which I speak, love, With a song on your lip and a smile on your cheek, love. Come, for my heart in your absence is weary— Haste, for my spirit is sickened and dreary— Come to the arms which alone should caress thee, JOSEPH BRENNAN. A Love Letter. My love-my chosen-but not mine! I send My whole heart to thee in these words I write; So let the blotted lines, my soul's sole friend, Irene, I have loved you, as men love Light, music, odor, beauty, love itself— Those daily needs which deal with dust and pelf. And I had been content, without one thought My wildest wish was vassal to thy will: My haughtiest hope a pensioner on thy smile, And so I write to you; and write and write, A LOVE LETTER. About the lonely casement of this room, Which you have left familiar with the grace 117 That grows where you have been. And on the gloom I almost fancy I can see your face. Perchance I shall not ever see again That face. I know that I shall never see With childhood's starry graces lingering yet Man cannot make, but may ennoble, fate, Love's orient out of darkness and of dust. Farewell, and yet again farewell, and yet Our days in music, to the self-same air; And I shall feel, wherever we may be, Even though in absence, and an alien clime, The shadow of the sunniness of thee, Hovering, in patience, through a clouded time. Farewell! the dawn is rising, and the light Sonnet. ́HENE'ER I recollect the happy time WE When you and I held converse, dear, together, There come a thousand thoughts of sunny weather, Of early blossoms and the fresh year's prime : Your memory lives forever in my mind With all the fragrant beauties of the Spring, With odorous lime and silver hawthorn twined, And many a noon-day woodland wandering. There's not a thought of you but brings along Some sunny dream of river, field, and sky; 'Tis wafted on the blackbird's sunset song, Or some wild snatch of ancient melody. And as I date it still, our love arose 'Twixt the last violet and the earliest rose. FRANCES ANNE KEMBLE. Lines Written in an Album. As S o'er the cold sepulchral stone Some name arrests the passer-by, And think my heart is buried here. LORD BYRON. LANGLEY LANE. 119 Langley Lane. N all the land, range up, range down, IN Is there ever a place so pleasant and sweet As Langley Lane in London town, Just out of the bustle of square and street? Swallows' nests in roof and wall, And up above, the still blue sky Where the woolly white clouds go sailing by,— I seem to be able to see it all. For now, in summer, I take my chair, square, And the swallows and sparrows chirping near; With her little hand's touch so warm and kind; Fanny is sweet thirteen, and she Has fine black ringlets and dark eyes clear, And I am older by summers three, Why should we hold each other so dear? Because she cannot utter a word, Nor hear the music of bee or bird, The water-cart's splash or the milkman's call! Because I have never seen the sky, Nor the little singers that hum and fly, Yet know she is gazing upon them all! |