Classic Poem

MARY'S WEDDING.
February 25th, 1851.

You are to be married, Mary,
This hour as I wakeful lie In the dreamy dawn of the morning,
Your wedding hour draws nigh;
Miles off, you are rising, dressing,
Your bridemaidens gay among,
In the same old rooms we played in,
You and I, when we were young.
Your bridemaids—they were our playmates:
Those known rooms, every wall,
Could speak of our childish frolics,
Loves, jealousies, great and small:
Do you mind how pansies changed we
And smiled at the word “forget?”-
'T was a girl's romance: yet somehow I have kept my pansy yet.

Do you mind our poems written
Together? our dreams of fame -
And of love -how we'd share all secrets
When that sweet mystery came? It is no mystery now,
Mary; It was unveiled, year by year,
Till - this is your marriage morning;
And I rest quiet here.
I cannot call up your face, Mary,
The face of the bride to-day:
You have outgrown my knowledge,
The years have so slipp'd away.
I see but your girlish likeness,
Brown eyes and brown falling hair;
God knows, I did love you dearly,
And was proud that you were fair.
Many speak my name, Mary,
While yours in home's silence lies:
The future I read in toil's guerdon,
You will read in your children's eyes:
The past—the same past with either—Is to you a delightsome scene,
But I cannot trace it clearly
For the graves that rise between.

I am glad you are happy,
Mary! These tears, could you see them fall,
Would show, though you have forgotten,
I have remembered all.
And though my cup may be empty
While yours is all running o'er,
Heaven keep you its sweetness, Mary,
Brimming for evermore.