By the heart's beat alone. Oh, silence is
Love's own peculiar eloquence of bliss!—
Music swept past:—it was a simple tone;
But it has wakened heartfelt sympathies;—
It has brought into life things past and gone;
Has wakened all those secret memories,
That may be smothered, but that still will be
Present within thy soul, young Rosalie!
The notes had roused an answering chord within:—
In other days, that song her vesper hymn had been.
Her altered look is pale:—that dewy eye
Almost belies the smile her rich lips wear;—
That smile is mocked by a scarce breathing sigh,
Which tells of silent and suppressed care—
Tells that the life is withering with despair,
More irksome from its unsunned silentness—
A festering wound the spirit pines to bear;