Page:Poems David.djvu/16

With wild clasped hands and cold and whitened lip,
Helpless to save she sees the sinking ship—
Upon the shore it drifts a heavy wreck,
While sea-gulls scream a requiem o'er her deck.
The childless widow to her home returns,
With anguish in her heart that almost burns
Her life away. In sad silent sorrow
She goes her lone way upon the morrow:
Along the sea-side sands she hears the roar
Of ocean waves, when on that rocky shore
There comes to her keen ears a piteous whine
Of a dumb one's grief and a poor brute's sign.
She listens a while, and then follows the sound,
And scarce has she paced the tall cliffs round
Ere she sees the mute friend of him her pride,
Who leads with sad step to her lost one's side.
There lowly she kneels by her dead boy's side
To kiss his white lips and his locks divide:
And watching him there through the tears that start
She sees her Bible pressed close to his heart.
With a prayer to her God, and long drawn sigh,
She asks that with him alone she might die.

And as time went on and year followed year,
The widow still looked with many a tear
On that Book of his with cover so worn,