The night was dark and fearful, The blast swept wailing by; A watcher, pale and tearful, Looked forth with anxious eye: How wistfully she gazes— No gleam of morn is there! And then her heart upraises Its agony of prayer. Within that dwelling lonely, Where want and darkness reign, Her precious child, her only, Lay moaning in his pain; And death alone can free him— She feels that this must be: “But oh! for morn to see him Smile once again on me!” A hundred lights are glancing In yonder mansion fair, And merry feet are dancing— They heed not morning there: Oh, young and lovely creatures, One lamp, from out your store, Would give that poor boy’s features To her fond gaze once more! The morning sun is shining— She heedeth not its ray; Beside her dead reclining, That pale, dead mother lay! A smile her lip was wreathing, A smile of hope and love, As though she still were breathing— “There ’s light for us above!”
The Watcher
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The night was dark and fearful, The blast swept wailing by; A watcher, pale and tearful, Looked forth with anxious eye: How wistfully she gazes— No gleam of morn is there! And then her heart upraises Its agony of prayer. Within that dwelling lonely, Where want and darkness reign, Her... |
The birds their love-notes warble Among the blossomed trees; The flowers are sighing forth their sweets To wooing honey-bees; The glad brook o’er a pebbly floor Goes dancing on its way,— But not a thing is so like spring As happy Alice Ray. An only child was Alice, And, like the blest... |