Sorrow, my friend, When shall you come again? The wind is slow, and the bent willows send Their silvery motions wearily down the plain. The bird is dead That sang this morning through the summer rain!...
There in the midst of gloom the church-spire rose, And not a star lit any side of heaven; In glades not far the damp reeds coldly touched Their sides, like soldiers dead before they fall;...
The sun is lying on the garden-wall, The full red rose is sweetening all the air, The day is happier than a dream most fair; The evening weaves afar a wide-spread pall,...
My graveyard holds no once-loved human forms, Grown hideous and forgotten, left alone, But every agony my heart has known, - The new-born trusts that died, the drift of storms. ...
Pray, have you heard the news? Sturdy in lungs and thews, There's a fine baby! Ring bells of crystal lip, Wave boughs with blossoming tip; Think what he may be!
Say not, sad bell, another hour hath come, Bare for the record of a world of crime; Toll, rather, friend, the end of hideous Time, Wherein we bloom, live, die, yet have no home! ...
Twenty bold mariners went to the wave, Twenty sweet breezes blew over the main; All were so hearty, so free, and so brave, - But they never came back again!