Classic Poem

" Winter wind is loud and wild, The
Come close to me, my darling child!
Forsake thy books and mateless play,
And, while the night is closing grey,
We'll talk its pensive hours away —

" Ierni, round our sheltered hall,
November's blasts unheeded call;
Not one faint breath can enter here
Enough to wave my daughter's hair;

" And I am glad to watch the blaze
Glance from her eyes, with mimic rays;
To feel her cheek so softly pressed
In happy quiet on my breast;

" But, yet, even this tranquillity
Brings bitter, restless thoughts to me;
And, in the red fire's cheerful glow,
I think of deep glens, blocked with snow;

" I dream of moor, and misty hill,
Where evening gathers, dark and chill,
For, lone, among the mountains cold
Lie those that I have loved of old,
And my heart aches, in speechless pain,
Exhausted with repinings vain,
That I shall see them ne'er again! "

" Father, in early infancy,
When you were far beyond the sea,
Such thoughts were tyrants over me —
I often sat for hours together,
Through the long nights of angry weather,
Raised on my pillow, to descry
The dim moon struggling in the sky;
Or, with strained ear, to catch the shock
Of rock with wave, and wave with rock.
So would I fearful vigil keep,
And, all for listening, never sleep;
But this world's life has much to dread:
Not so, my father, with the Dead.

" O not for them should we despair;
The grave is drear, but they are not there:
Their dust is mingled with the sod;
Their happy souls are gone to God!
You told me this, and yet you sigh,
And murmur that your friends must die.
Ah, my dear father, tell me why?

" For, if your former words were true,
How useless would such sorrow be!
As wise to mourn the seed which grew
Unnoticed on its parent tree,

" Because it fell in fertile earth
And sprang up to a glorious birth —
Struck deep its roots, and lifted high
Its green boughs in the breezy sky!

" But I'll not fear — I will not weep
For those whose bodies lie asleep:
I know there is a blessed shore
Opening its ports for me and mine;
And, gazing Time's wide waters o'er,
I weary for that land divine,

" Where we were born — where you and I
Shall meet our dearest, when we die;
From suffering and corruption free,
Restored into the Deity. "

" Well hast thou spoken, sweet, trustful child!
And wiser than thy sire:
And coming tempests, raging wild,
Shall strengthen thy desire —
Thy fervent hope, through storm and foam,
Through wind and Ocean's roar,
To reach, at last, the eternal home —
Steadfast, changeless shore!, The