RECOLLECTIONS.
163
A home amid the stranger crowds, where I
Have learned to wear the mask that others wear,
To smile while agony is in my soul.
Yet at an hour like this, when Nature glows
With deepest loveliness, when earth and heaven
Unite to woo my heart from its retreat
Of gloom and sorrow, I can wander back
To quench my faint and sinking spirit's thirst
At young life's gushing fountains, and forget
That I am not once more a happy child.
Have learned to wear the mask that others wear,
To smile while agony is in my soul.
Yet at an hour like this, when Nature glows
With deepest loveliness, when earth and heaven
Unite to woo my heart from its retreat
Of gloom and sorrow, I can wander back
To quench my faint and sinking spirit's thirst
At young life's gushing fountains, and forget
That I am not once more a happy child.
