Poems (Chitwood)/Leoline
LEOLINE.
I've rambled where the lilies blow,In summer-time, their bells of snow,And dreamed a dream of long ago.
I sat beside a little mound,The crimson leaves were drifting roundUpon the sere and frosty ground.
The pale moon to her azure tent,Like a young nun in silence went,With form by woe, not winters, bent.
That little mound—within its breast,Was laid in sweet and peaceful rest,The form of her I loved the best.
Dimly, beneath their waxen fold,The pale blue, misty eyes are rolled,And cheeks are white and lips are cold.
Soft o'er the blue-veined brow, as fairAs scarcely opened lilies are,Sweeps back a cloud of golden hair.
Thus Fancy hath her form arrayed,Painting in light instead of shade—Long years ago that grave was made.
And Fancy knew not what she did;For should I raise that coffin lid,Where years ago that form was hid,
No single feature I could traceOf that beloved, meek young face,That once was in the grave's embrace;
But just before my tearful eyesA cloud of golden dust would rise,And drift us slowly to the skies,
As sometimes from a flowret's urn,When daylight's amber torches burn,And queen Aurora doth return,
A fairy starts up from her sleep,Confused with murmurs, soft and deep,Of winds that all about her creep,
And dons a dew-robe, clear and bright,And rises slowly from the sightTo quiet tents composed of light.
Oh! thanks that from the cheerless tomb,Where all is silence, darkness, gloom,The bud breaks forth in lovely bloom.
And in another, fairer sphere,More beautiful than ever here,I shall see Leoline my dear.