Giovanni

What shade has fallen this loved threshold o'er
Without glad presage never crossed before?
Why through the past does startled memory range,
Then shrink to meet the desolating change?
Hushed is the dwelling, cold the hearthstone now.
Whose glow plays not upon thy manly brow;
For cordial grasp of hands the pleading eye,"
For lettered talk the faintly smothered sigh,
For looks intent to solve, respond, or cheer,
Thine wan from pain, ours agonized with fear;
For bland philosophy and genial wit,
Wont round this group instinctively to flit,
Half-uttered prayers, the stillness of dismay
In dread suspense exhaust the winter day.
The keenest pang humanity can feel
Came in that hour of nature's mute appeal,
As waned expression to its last eclipse,
And speech grew palsied on thy frigid lips;
Yet thought and love before the parting sigh,
Converged and flickered in thy glazing eye.
The artist-friend, whose triumph thou believed
Ere fame ordained or genius had achieved,
Crouched by the form, now stilled in death's embrace,
Strove with dim eyes thy lineaments to trace.
"Yet can it be?" our hearts bewildered cried,
"That he, the idol of this home, has died!"
The leaf o'er which in calm delight he hung,
The plaintive rhyme that trembled from his tongue,
The honored effigies so fondly sought,
Of those who conquered in the realm of thought,
His elements of life — these all are here,
And more than these — the loved-ones round the bier.
Two whose gray hair with daily joy he crowned,
Two who in him fraternal guidance found.
When up the aisle familiar to thy tread,
Moved the long train by white-robed pastors led,
And at the altar, where thou oft hast bowed,
We tearful knelt, and laid thee in thy shroud;
When those deep tones on which with youthful pride,
For wisdom's banquet thou so well relied,
Breathed the last prayer that mortal rites delay,
In faltering accents o'er thy senseless clay;
The sternest wept, and even worldly men
Felt the poor refuge of ambition then.
The Christmas garlands still with verdure hung,
The temple where thy funeral hymn was sung,
And as it echoed, like a holy spell,
The blest assurance of a short farewell,
A flood of sunshine broke upon our sight,
And wreathed the mourners with supernal light;
In golden mists the peaceful cadence died,
And Nature hailed what Faith has prophesied!
Ah! might Grief nestle in this sacred air,
Shielded from view and unprofaned by care!
How grates the discord of the teeming street,
The rush of steeds, and tramp of busy feef,
How vain the stir, how pitiless the glare,
To those who sorrow's aching badges wear!
Yet even here our brother's worth appears,
To fill with honour his remembered years;
In yonder pile — the wretch's last retreat,
Where Charity and Science nobly meet,
With steadfast heart, with love-inspired brain,
And patient zeal, he ministered to pain.
Welcome the vistas of the hills and sea,
Whose pure enchantments ever solaced thee,
As from the city's strife our dark array,
Emerged to meet the forest and the bay:
There is a balm in Nature's open face
That over anguish casts a soothing grace;
The winds mourn with us, and the fading day
Serenely whispers — all must pass away;
Each herb and tree with promise are imbued,
Withered to bloom, despoiled to be renewed;
From every knoll a boundless void we see,
So, love bereft, appears the world to thee:
Here where the portals of the East arise,
And falls the earliest greeting from the skies,
Our heavy burden in the earth we lay,
Far heavier that our hearts must bear away!