That shrouds her cold and pulseless breast No! if a word could break her rest, And give back life, love, all That once made life so bright, so dear, I could not - could not wish her here! Now let the tempest pour its wrath The clouds that lower upon my path And oh! 'tis something still to know, By her, who, snatched in loveliest bloom, Life's burden I have learned to bear, Nor have one other heart to share The pangs that rend my own! Yes, yes, loved pledge! where now my view Is fixed upon the raven hue, It softens sorrow's moan To know-whate'er 'tis mine to brave- TO THE DYING YEAR. BY J. G. BROOKS. THOU desolate and dying year! Since nature smiled upon thy birth, Sad alteration! now how lone, How verdureless is nature's breast, Where ruin makes his empire known, In Autumn's yellow vesture drest; The sprightly bird, whose carol sweet Broke on the breath of early day, The summer flowers she loved to greet; The bird, the flowers, Oh! where are they? Thou desolate and dying year! Yet lovely in thy lifelessness As beauty stretched upon the bier, In death's clay cold, and dark caress; There's loveliness in thy decay, Which breathes, which lingers on thee still, Like memory's mild and cheering ray Beaming upon the night of ill. Yet, yet, the radiance is not gone, Which shed a richness o'er the scene, Which smiled upon the golden dawn, When skies were brilliant and serene; Oh! still a melancholy smile Gleams upon Nature's aspect fair, Thou desolate and dying year! Since time entwined thy vernal wreath, How often love hath shed the tear, And knelt beside the bed of death ; How many hearts that lightly sprung When joy was blooming but to die, Their finest chords by death unstrung, Have yielded life's expiring sigh, And pillowed low beneath the clay, Have ceased to melt, to breathe, to burn; The proud, the gentle, and the gay, Gathered unto the mouldering urn; Thou desolate and dying year! The musing spirit finds in thee Lessons, impressive and serene, Of deep and stern morality; Thou teachest how the germ of youth, Which blooms in being's dawning day, Planted by nature, reared by truth, Withers like thee in dark decay. Promise of youth! fair as the form As if her magic voice were strung And love which never can expire, From the pure fountains of the sky; That ray which glows and brightens still Unchanged, eternal and divine; Where seraphs own its holy thrill, Thou desolate and dying year! Thy buds are gone, thy leaves are sear, And all the garniture that shed, A brilliancy upon thy prime, Hath like a morning vision fled Unto the expanded grave of time. Time! Time! in thy triumphal flight, The broken wreck of Fortune's war. There in disorder, dark and wild, Are seen the fabrics once so high; Which mortal vanity had piled As emblems of eternity! And deemed the stately piles, whose forms Frowned in their majesty sublime, Would stand unshaken by the storms That gathered round the brow of Time. Thou desolate and dying year! Earth's brightest pleasures fade like thine; Like evening shadows disappear, And leave the spirit to repine. The stream of life that used to pour Where hath the morning splendour flown, Which danced upon that crystal stream? Where are the joys to childhood known, When life was an enchanted dream? Enveloped in the starless night, Which destiny hath overspread; Enroll'd upon that trackless flight Where the death wing of time hath sped! Oh! thus hath life its even-tide It withers like the yellow leaf: When plundered of its summer bloom; And such is life's autumnal hour, Which heralds man unto the tomb! |