Classic Poem

SECOND DREAM .

BESSY BELL AND MARY GRAY.

O HUSH'D be our souls as this Burial-ground!
And let our feet without a sound
Glide o'er the mournful clay;
For lo! two radiant Creatures flitting
O'er the grave-stones! now moveless sitting
On a low funeral mound! 'Tis day!
And, but that ghosts where'er they rove
Do in their breathless beauty love
The cold, the wan, and the silent light
O'er the Church-yard shed by the Queen of Night,
Sure Sister-Shades were They!
— Of many 'tis the holy faith,
E'er from the dying frame
Departs the latest lingering breath,
Its earthly garb the same,
A shadowy Likeness still doth come,
A noiseless, pale-faced, beckoning Wraith
To call the Stranger home!
Or, are ye Angels! who from bliss,
With dewy fall, unto our earth
On wings of Paradise descend,
The grave of Innocence to kiss,
And tears of an immortal birth
With human tears to blend!
Aye! there they sit! like earthly Creatures
With softer, sadder, fainter features!
A Halo round each head;
Fair Things whose earthly course is o'er,
And who bring from some far-distant shore
The beauty that on earth they wore,
With the silence of the dead.

The dream of Ghost and Angel fades,
And I gaze upon two Orphan-Maids,
Frail Creatures, doom'd to die!
Spirits may be fair in their heavenly sleep,
But sure when mortal Beings weep
In tears a beauty lies more deep,
The glimmering of mortality!
Their aged Friend in slumber lies,
And hath closed for an hour the only eyes
That ever cheered their orphan-state,
At the hour of birth left desolate!
She sleeps! and now these Maids have come
With mournful hearts to this mournful home,
Led here by a pensive train
Of thoughts still brooding on the dead!
For they have watched the breast of Pain
Till it moved not on its bed,
The lifeless lips together prest,
And many a ghastly body drest,
And framed the shroud for the corse of bone
That lay unheeded and alone,
When all its friends were dead and gone!

So they walk not to yon breezy mountain
To sit in the shade of its silvery fountain,
And 'mid that lofty air serene
Forget the dim and wailing scene
That spreads beneath their feet!
They walk not down yon fairy stream
Whose liquid lapses sweet
Might wrap them in some happy dream
Of a pure, calm, far retreat,
As on that rivulet seems to flow,
Escaping from a world of Wo!
But this still realm is their delight,
And hither they repair
Communion with the Dead to hold!
Peaceful, as at the fall of night,
Two little Lambkins gliding white
Return unto the gentle air
That sleeps within the Fold.
Or like two Birds to their lonely nest,
Or wearied waves to their bay of rest,
Or fleecy clouds, when their race is run,
That hang, in their own beauty blest,
'Mid the calm that sanctifies the west
Around the setting Sun.

Phantoms! ye waken to mine eye
Sweet trains of earthly imagery!
Whate'er on Nature's breast is found
In loveliness without a sound,
That silent seems to soul and sense,
Emblem of perfect Innocence!
Two radiant dew-drops that repose
On mossy bank at Evening's close,
And happy in the gentle weather,
In beauty disappear together!
Two flowers upon the lonesome moor,
When a dim day of storm is o'er,
Lifting up their yellow hair
To meet the balm of the slumbering air.
Two Sea-birds from the troubled ocean
Floating with a snowy motion,
In the absence of the gale
Over a sweet inland vale!
Two early-risen Stars that lie
Together on the Evening-sky,
And imperceptibly pursue
Their walk along the depths of blue
— Sweet Beings! on my dreams ye rise
With all your frail humanities!
Nor Earth below, nor Heaven above,
An image yields of Peace and Love,
So perfect as your pensive breath
That brings unsought a dream of death!
Each sigh more touching than the last,
Till Life's pathetic tune be past!