My Father

As die the embers on the hearth,
And o'er the floor the shadows fall,
And creeps the chirping cricket forth,
And ticks the deathwatch in the wall,
I see a form in yonder chair,
That grows beneath the waning light;
There are the wan, sad features — there
The pallid brow, and locks of white!
My father! when they laid thee down,
And heap'd the clay upon thy breast,
And left thee sleeping all alone
Upon thy narrow couch of rest —
I know not why, I could not weep,
The soothing drops refused to roll —
And oh, that grief is wild and deep
Which settles tearless on the soul!
But when I saw thy vacant chair —
Thine idle hat upon the wall —
Thy book — the pencilled passage where
Thine eye had rested last of all —
The tree beneath whose friendly shade
Thy trembling feet had wandered forth —
The very prints those feet had made,
When last they feebly trod the earth —
And thought, while countless ages fled,
Thy vacant seat would vacant stand,
Unworn thy hat, thy book unread,
Effaced thy footsteps from the sand —
And widowed in this cheerless world,
The heart that gave its love to thee —
Torn, like a vine whose tendrils curled
More closely round the fallen tree! —
Oh, father! then for her and thee
Gushed madly forth the scorching tears;
And oft, and long, and bitterly,
Those tears have gush'd in later years;
For as the world grows cold around,
And things take on their real hue,
'T is sad to learn that love is found
Alone above the stars, with you!