Poems (Stephens)/Beautiful lives

by Eliza Jane Stephens

BEAUTIFUL LIVES.

Oh beautiful lives some are living,
 Unheeded, it may be unknown,
That will never be written in story,
 Or graven on standard or stone.

So quietly doing their duties,
 So patient with burdens to bear,
That smother whatever of gladness
 Their spirits could otherwise share.

And such have I seen, so devoted
 To one who had blighted their life,
Had wasted of talent and fortune
 In vice and dishonor and strife.

Had made an abode of stern sorrow
 What once was a beautiful home;
Had broken the heart of the mother
 And driven the children to roam,

And yet when by reason of weakness,
 His steps he no longer could guide,
These friends gave an arm to support him
 And never a word that would chide.

And watched with a pleasure unfeigned,
 Each slight indication of thought,
Well knowing that his was a ruin,
 That selfish indulgence had wrought.

And when at the last they had laid him
 To slumber beneath the green sod,
They buried his faults and his follies,
 Commending his soul unto God.

Ah, these had the spirit of martyrs,
 And are to such nearly allied;
They braved a whole host of misfortunes
 And conquered ambition and pride.