Poems (Edwards)/Let me Dream of Heaven

by Matilda Caroline Smiley Edwards

LET ME DREAM OF HEAVEN.

Ye guardians of the night!
 That round my bed-side stand,
Ye shadowy throng that rise
 Up from the viewless land;
O! tell me not of earth,
 Of joys that it has given,
Tell, tell not of the past,
 But let me dream of Heaven.

Tell, tell me not of all
 The hopes that I have known,
The hopes that long ago,
 Like blossoms round me shone;
Tell, tell me not of joys
 That o'er life's sky were driven,
Like snow-drops melting as they fell;
 But let me dream of Heaven.

Ye spirits! tell me not
 Of friendship's fettering chain,
Aye, know ye not how soon
 Its links are rent in twain;
Know ye how soon alas!
 The heart-cords may be riven,
O! tell me not of these,
 But let me dream of Heaven.

O! speak not of the things
 That bind me to this earth,
Speak not to me of home,
 My own dear "home and hearth;"
Tell not of all the friends
 That have to me been given,
Away with these, and all such dreams,
 And let me dream of Heaven.