Poems (Barker)/The Exiles Dream

by Alice J. Green Barker

The Exile's Dream.

I dreamed last night that it was gone,
 The weary pain of years;
I dreamed the stain was washed away
 By my repentant tears.
Again I felt a father's hand
 Laid gently on my head,
And low and gentle were the words
 That he in blessing said.

My mother stood with out-stretched arms
 Extended to her boy,
And sister Nellie's dark blue eyes
 Were filled with tears of joy.
Again we gathered 'round the board,
 And smiles were on each face,
And pleasure ruled the fleeting hours
 With her bewildering ways.

And when my father knelt in prayer
 Among that happy band,
I fondly knelt at mother's side
 And clasped her loving hand,
Just as I did in boyhood days
 Before the shadow came
That blackened all our lives with woe,
 And stained the honored name.

And thick and fast my tear drops fell,
 As father prayed for all,
And murmured "blest be thy dear name,
 For thou hast heard our call."
But when we rose to say "good night,"
 And Nellie kissed my brow,
I felt the maddening pain again,
 Just as I feel it now.

For oh, I drank the sparkling wine!
 And fell beneath its power;
I took the life I could not give
 In an unguarded hour;
And though I fled from justice far,
 Through all these weary years,
I've heard my father's bitter cry
 And seen my mother's tears.

Oh! ye who love the tempting glass,
 List to my pleading prayer,
Turn from the maddening mocking spell!
 The murderer's fate beware!
My life is filled with bitter woe,
 And stripped of pleasure's flowers;
I only see the forms I love
 In dreamland's mystic hours.