The Violet's Love

by Frances S. Osgood

the violet’s love.

Shall I tell what the violet said to the star,
While she gazed through her tears on his beauty, afar?
She sang, but her singing was only a sigh,
And nobody heard it, but Heaven, Love, and I,
A sigh, full of fragrance and beauty, it stole
Through the stillness up, up, to the star’s beaming soul.

She sang—“Thou art glowing with glory and might,
And I’m but a flower, frail, lowly, and light.
I ask not thy pity, I seek not thy smile;
I ask but to worship thy beauty awhile;
To sigh to thee, sing to thee, bloom for thine eye,
And when thou art weary, to bless thee and die!”

Shall I tell what the star to the violet said,
While ashamed, ’neath his love-look, she hung her young head?
He sang—but his singing was only a ray,
And none but the flower and I heard the dear lay.
How it thrilled, as it fell, in its melody clear,
Through the little heart, heaving with rapture and fear!

Ah no! love! I dare not! too tender, too pure,
For me to betray, were the words he said to her;
But as she lay listening that low lullaby,
A smile lit the tear in the timid flower’s eye;
And when death had stolen her beauty and bloom,
The ray came again to play over her tomb.