Poems (Toke)/Lines (Oh! when some lone familiar strain)

by Emma Toke

For works with similar titles, see Lines.

LINES.

H! when some lone familiar strain
 Pours o'er the car its melting tone,
How swiftly memory flies again
 To scenes and hours for ever flown.

Yes! like the voice of one beloved,
 It thrills upon the inmost heart,
Till slumbering thoughts long, long unmoved.
 Again to life and being start.

And as each lingering cadence dies
 In sweetness on the spell-bound car,
Oh! swift the cherished forms arise,
 Of all to whom its tones were dear.

The loved—more loved than tongue can tell.—
 The far away,—the cherished dead,—
Each scene where Fancy loves to dwell,
 And feed on hours for ever tied;

All all return to bless our sight,
 Though joy perchance be tinged with pain,
And o'er life's billows, calm and bright,
 The torch of Memory beams again,

'Tis passing sweet, when Music swells
 With power and magic all her own,
To feel some loved remembrance dwells
 Enshrined in every breathing tone;

And think our image too may rest
 Embalmed in such sweet numbers' flow,
And rise o'er some still faithful breast,
 Undimmed by absence, joy, or woe.

Perchance the wish may seem but vain,
 Yet still to me the thought is dear,
From fond affection thus to claim
 The meed of gentle Memory's tear.

Then oh! not yet ye numbers cease:
 Breathe, breathe again that mournful air:
'Mid Nature's tears the how of Peace
 In mellowed light is beaming there!

E.

May 8, 1533.