Classic Poem

When Lady Falkland made her home
In this fair land of Acadie
She loved incessantly to roam
About the woods and fields with thee,
O'er many a daisied meadow, green,
She danced with thee, sweet Josephine.

Past hedges of pink roses, wild,
That on the air their fragrance fling,
Ye wandered, thou scarce more than child,
She daughter of the Sailor King;
Where clustered hawthorns outward lean
Ye rested, often, Josephine.

Down lilac-bordered lanes ye went,
With honeysuckle half abloom,
And caught the shy, delicious scent
Of slender violets, hid in gloom,
Ye plucked the saffron celandine
And flaming Turk's-cap, Josephine.

When autumn's ripeness filled the air
And woods with scarlet were inwrought
And golden-rod gleamed everywhere,
The deep-blue gentian, fringed, ye sought,
No flower that grew was e'er too mean
To make your garland, Josephine.

She begged thy mother, but in vain,
For long companionship with thee,
She would have had thee in her train,
Her ward at court, perchance, to be,
What marvels might'st thou not have seen
Had'st thou gone with her, Josephine!

Ye parted, as so many part;
The fire of love, a ruddy flame,
Kindled in each responsive heart
But doomed to perish as it came, —
To be revived, sometime, I ween
In friendlier worlds, young Josephine.