A Pine-Tree Buoy

Where all the winds were tranquil,
And all the odors sweet,
And rings of tumbling upland
Sloped down to kiss your feet:

There, in a nest of verdure,
You grew from bud to bough;
You heard the song at mid-day,—
At eve the plighted vow.

But fate that gives a guerdon
Takes back a double fee:
She hewed you from your homestead
And set you in the sea.

And every bowling billow
Bends down your barren head
To hearken if the whisper
Of what you knew is dead.