Poems (Osgood)/The Spirit's Voyage

by Frances Sargent Osgood

THE SPIRIT'S VOYAGE.

"When the child was buried, a little canoe with a sail to it, laden with bread-fruit and cocoas, was sent off from the shore with a fair wind, in order, as they said, to bear the spirit of the dead away from the land of the living"

"They've fill'd with fruit their frail canoe,
With fruit and flowers of brilliant hue,
A blooming freight—but whose the hand
To guide the light thing front the land?
So feathery light,—'twould seem a sin
To trust a fairy's weight within.
The waves are bright,—the skies are fair,—
A balmy blessing is the air,—
Her sail is set,—she glides away!
Where goes the graceful boat to-day?
I hear no voice come o'er the tide;
I see no form the helm beside;
And it might seem a moment's toy,
But that they wear no smile of joy,
And fondly watch its snowy wing,
As if it were a holy thing:—
Why send they forth their boat to be
A plaything for the reckless sea
"Oh, stranger! calm or wild the tide,
Their light canoe will safely glide,
And all unscathed by tempest-shock,
By coral-reef or roughest rock,
Ere morn, its white sail will be furl'd
Forever in the spirit-world.
A viewless hand that bark obeys,
A voice unheard the sea-wave sways,
A thing so holy and so fair,
Serene and safe, is smiling there,
That fiercest winds before it falter,
And into harmless zephyrs alter.
Ah! well may they the wanderer mark;
For know,—within that blessed bark,
The spirit of a little child
Is playing on the waters wild!
Behold our chieftain's burial-ground!
We raised to-day another mound.
Behold its lone and hallow'd tree
So graceful and so fair was she.
But look!—the boat is seen no more;
The mourning train have left the shore;
And, hark! those accents sad and wild!
Our island chief laments his child."

 

THE LAMENT.

No more!—ah! never, never more!
 Her precious feet will tread,
Like light, our dwelling's coral floor,^[1]
 By young affection led;

Those little feet, whose graceful fall,
 So airy and so gay,
Broke not the frailest shell of all
 That glitter'd in her way.

No more! Ah! never, never more,
 Her glancing hands will braid
Our painted mats to shade the door,
 Where warm the noontide play'd!

No more with lightest limbs she'll spring
 Far up the cocoa-tree,
No more the cocoa-cup she'll bring,
 With sunny smile to me!

But safer, through the land of souls,
 Those tender feet shall go,
And where the endless river rolls,
 More rich the cocoas grow;

And still beneath her joyous hand
 The spirit-fruit shall rise,
Forever blooming through the land,
 Where nothing droops and dies!

Her dark hair's long and glossy stream,
 Shall bright kahullahs deck;
And wreaths of rainbow shells shall gleam
 Around her arms and neck.

Play on amid those fragrant bowers,
 My fair and happy child!
Ere long another bark of ours
 Shall brave the waters wild;

And though 'twould scarce—a boat so weak,
 The sin-weigh'd soul, sustain,
A father's spirit cannot seek
 His only child in vain!

1. The floor of the hut is strewed with fragments of coral and shell.