A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields/The Foundling (Alexandre Soumet)
THE FOUNDLING.
I have shaken off the painful, painful sleep
Unvisited by happy dreams;
Ere the first ray of sunlight gleams
Upon the hill—thereon in dark I creep.
With smiling Nature, waking up,
The young bird twitters under the white-thorn in flower;
Its mother brings it sweet, soft food this hour;
Mine eyes are like an over-brimming cup.
Ah! Wherefore have I not a mother?
Wherefore am I not like that young bird
Whose nest is balanced on the boughs wind-stirred?
Nothing on earth is mine—no brother—
Not even a cradle had I; on a stone
Before the village church I had been left;
A passer found me lying all alone,
Homeless and friendless, and of help bereft.
Far from my banished parents, never known,
Of all caresses ignorant I live,
And the children of the valley never own
Or call me sister, or aught in kindness give.
I never join in games of evening's hour
When women spin and children stories hear.
Under his roof of thatch, that trees embower,
The peasant never calls me when I'm near.
But from afar I see his children all
Around the crackling vine-leaves in a glow,
Search on his knees the sweet caress of eve.
Towards the open chapel tired I crawl,
Oft weeping—the only house below
Where I am not a stranger; the only door
Which does not shut at my approach. I grieve
But feel consoled when kneeling on that floor.
Then at the hour of prayer
Often my wandering footsteps stray
Among the lonely tombs. No peace is there.
The tombs are all indifferent unto me.
The poor girl has no kinsfolk 'mid the dead,
As on the earth no help or stay.
For fourteen springs I've wept for thee,
And longed to rest upon thy breast my head.
Return, oh mother, that hast so long fled,
I wait here by the stone; return, by pity led,
Where once in agony wild
Thou hadst forsaken thy poor child.