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The brook that down the valley
So musically drips,
Flowed never half so brightly
As the light laugh from her lips.

Her face was like the lily,
Her heart was like the rose,...

One bright memory shines like a star
In the sky of my spirit forever;
And over my pathway it flashes afar
A radiance that perishes never.

One bright memory -- only one;...

His face was sad; some shadow must have hung
Above his soul; its folds, now falling dark,
Now almost bright; but dark or not so dark,
Like cloud upon a mount, 'twas always there --...

The priests stood waiting in the holy place,
Impatient of delay
(Isaiah had been read),
When sudden up the aisle there came a face
Like a lost sun's ray;
And the child was led...

The Master's voice was sweet:
"I gave My life for thee;
Bear thou this cross thro' pain and loss,
Arise and follow Me."
I clasped it in my hand --
O Thou! who diedst for me,...

Go! heart of mine! the way is long --
The night is dark -- the place is far;
Go! kneel and pray, or chant a song,
Beside two graves where Mary's star
Shines o'er two children's hearts at rest,...

Thou art sleeping, brother, sleeping
In thy lonely battle grave;
Shadows o'er the past are creeping,
Death, the reaper, still is reaping,
Years have swept, and years are sweeping...

Father Keeler died February 28, 1880, in Mobile, Ala.
Inscribed to his sister.



"Sweet Christ! let him live, ah! we need his life,
And woe to us if he goes!...

Young as the youngest who donned the Gray,
True as the truest that wore it,
Brave as the bravest he marched away,
(Hot tears on the cheeks of his mother lay)
Triumphant waved our flag one day --...

Superior General of the Congregation of the Mission and of the Sisters of Charity.



A shadow slept folded in vestments,
The dream of a smile on its face,
Dim, soft as the gleam after sunset...

To the Children of Mary of the Cathedral of Mobile



In the mystical dim of the temple,
In the dream-haunted dim of the day,
The sunlight spoke soft to the shadows,...

The death of men is not the death
Of rights that urged them to the fray;
For men may yield
On battle-field
A noble life with stainless shield,
And swords may rust
Above their dust,...

When I am dead, and all will soon forget
My words, and face, and ways --
I, somehow, think I'll walk beside thee yet
Adown thy after days.

I die first, and you will see my grave;...

Gather the sacred dust
Of the warriors tried and true,
Who bore the flag of a Nation's trust
And fell in a cause, though lost, still just,
And died for me and you.

Gather them one and all,...

They come, as the breeze comes over the foam,
Waking the waves that are sinking to sleep --
The fairest of memories from far-away home,
The dim dreams of faces beyond the dark deep.
...

The olden golden stories of the world,
That stirred the past,
And now are dim as dreams,
The lays and legends which the bards unfurled
In lines that last,
All -- rhymed with glooms and gleams....

Oft within our little cottage,
As the shadows gently fall,
While the sunlight touches softly
One sweet face upon the wall,
Do we gather close together,
And in hushed and tender tone...

Sweet, blessed beads! I would not part
With one of you for richest gem
That gleams in kingly diadem;
Ye know the history of my heart.

For I have told you every grief...

Only a few more years!
Weary years!
Only a few more tears!
Bitter tears!
And then -- and then -- like other men,
I cease to wander, cease to weep,
Dim shadows o'er my way shall creep;...

I walk down the Valley of Silence --
Down the dim, voiceless valley -- alone!
And I hear not the fall of a footstep
Around me, save God's and my own;
And the hush of my heart is as holy...