Lines to a Lady

Lady, I love, at eventide,
When stars, as now, are on the wave,
To stray in loneliness, and muse
Upon the one dear form that gave
Its sunlight to my boyhood; oft
That same sweet look sinks, still and soft,
Upon my spirit, and appears
As lovely as in by-gone years.

Eve's low, faint wind is breathing now,
With deep and soul-like murmuring,
Through the dark pines; and thy sweet words
Seem borne on its mysterious wing;
And oft, mid musings sad and lone,
At night's deep noon, that thrilling tone
Swells in the wind, low, wild, and clear,
Like music in the dreaming air.

When sleep's calm wing is on my brow,
And dreams of peace my spirit lull,
Before me, like a misty star,
That form floats dim and beautiful;
And, when the gentle moonbeam smiles
On the blue streams and dark-green isles,
In every ray pour'd down the sky,
That same light form seems stealing by.

It is a blessed picture, shrined
In memory's urn; the wing of years
Can change it not, for there it glows,
Undimm'd by "weaknesses and tears;"
Deep-hidden in its still recess,
It beams with love and holiness,
O'er hours of being, dark and dull,
Till life seems almost beautiful.

The vision cannot fade away;
'Tis in the stillness of my heart,
And o'er its brightness I have mused
In solitude; it is a part
Of my existence; a dear flower
Breathed on by Heaven: morn's earliest hour
That flower bedews, and its blue eye
At eve still rests upon the sky.

Lady, like thine, my visions cling
To the dear shrine of buried years;
The past, the past! it is too bright,
Too deeply beautiful for tears;
We have been bless'd; though life is made
A tear, a silence, and a shade,
And years have left the vacant breast
To loneliness — we have been bless'd!

Those still, those soft, those summer eyes,
When by our favourite stream we stood,
And watch'd our mingling shadows there,
Soft-pictured in the deep-blue flood,
Seem'd one enchantment. O! we felt,
As there, at love's pure shrine, we knelt,
That life was sweet, and all its hours
A glorious dream of love and flowers.

And still 'tis sweet. Our hopes went by
Like sounds upon the unbroken sea;
Yet memory wings the spirit back
To deep, undying melody;
And still, around her early shrine,
Fresh flowers their dewy chaplets twine,
Young Love his brightest garland wreathes,
And Eden's richest incense breathes.

Our hopes are flown — yet parted hours
Still in the depths of memory lie,
Like night-gems in the silent blue
Of summer's deep and brilliant sky;
And Love's bright flashes seem again
To fall upon the glowing chain
Of our existence. Can it be
That all is but a mockery?

Lady, adieu! to other climes
I go, from joy, and hope, and thee;
A weed on Time's dark waters thrown,
A wreck on life's wild-heaving sea;
I go; but O, the past, the past!
Its spell is o'er my being cast, —
And still, to Love's remember'd eves,
With all but hope, my spirit cleaves.

Adieu! adieu! My farewell words
Are on my lyre, and their wild flow
Is faintly dying on the chords,
Broken and tuneless. Be it so!
Thy name — O, may it never swell
My strain again — yet long 'twill dwell
Shrined in my heart, unbreathed, unspoken —
A treasured word — a cherish'd token.