Poems (Greenwood)/Songs

by Grace Greenwood

SONGS.

I.

No passionless creature of duty,
 No child of capricious delay,
Our love, like the goddess of beauty,
 Sprang into warm life in a day!
Around us her magic spells flinging,
 She smiled as she saw we adored,
And then, in a burst of wild singing,
 Her soul's morning raptures outpoured.

Ah, soon changed that song, born in heaven,
 To farewells and passionate sighs!
For a mist, like the shadow of even,
 Came over her violet eyes:
With Hope's golden sunshine around her,
 On Joy's couch of roses half-blown,
Pale, cold as a snow-wreath, we found her;—
 Her glowing young spirit had flown!

II.

Though now it were madness to cherish
 The dream that enchained us so long,
Yet shall it not utterly perish,
 For thou hast embalmed it in song:
Its story's exquisite revealing
 Shall live on the lips of the young;
Each change of its passionate feeling
 Be gayly or mournfully sung.

Like honey-dew dropping on blossoms,
 On hearts thy sweet numbers shall fall;
Thy lays shall thrill desolate bosoms,
 And tenderest visions recall;
Now wild, like the rapturous greeting
 That song-birds send down from above;
Now sad, like the tremulous beating
 Of hearts that are breaking with love.

III.

We must silence, with words of cold reason,
 The eloquent voice of the heart;
For Love hath stayed out his brief season,
 And spread his young wing to depart!
Though awhile round our memory he hovers,
 He may smilingly offer no more
Fond words, the ambrosia of lovers,
 Nor the nectar of passion outpour.

Our last tearful farewell is spoken,
 Life's sweet morning-vision hath flown!
Each vow, each glad promise, is broken,
 That twined our twin beings in one!
And severed are love's golden fetters,
 And sympathy's silvery chain;
So please, Sir, return me my letters,
 I may wish to use them again!