The babes whose dimpled fingers With never a cloud upon them, Twin brothers bold and brave, A breath, and the vision is lifted They tell me his mind is failing, He is only back with the children, And still, as the summer sunset "Say, love, have the children come?" And I answer, with eyes uplifted, "Yes, dear! they are all at home. Margaret Sangster [1838 THE MORNING-GLORY WE wreathed about our darling's head Her little face looked out beneath, So full of life and light, The Morning-Glory So lit as with a sunrise, That we could only say, "She is the morning-glory true, And her poor types are they." So always from that happy time As from the trellis smiles the flower But not so beautiful they rear As turned her sweet eyes to the light, We used to think how she had come, The last and perfect added gift To crown Love's morning hour; We never could have thought, O God, Like the morning-glory's cup; We never thought to see her droop Her fair and noble head, Till she lay stretched before our eyes, 313 The morning-glory's blossoming Will soon be coming round We see the rows of heart-shaped leaves But the glory of our morning Has passed away from earth. O Earth! in vain our aching eyes Too harsh thy dews, too gross thine air Her spirit to sustain; But up in groves of Paradise Full surely we shall see Our morning-glory beautiful Twine round our dear Lord's knee. Maria White Lowell [1821-1855] SHE CAME AND WENT As a twig trembles, which a bird As clasps some lake, by gusts unriven, As, at one bound, our swift spring heaps An angel stood and met my gaze, Through the low doorway of my tent; The First Snow-fall; 315 I Oh, when the room grows slowly dim, THE FIRST SNOW-FALL AT THE Snow had begun in the gloaming, Had been heaping field and highway Every pine and fir and hemlock From sheds new-roofed with Carrara I stood and watched by the window I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn Up spoke our own little Mabel, Saying, "Father, who makes it snow?" And I told of the good All-father Who cares for us here below. Again I looked at the snow-fall, And thought of the leaden sky That arched o'er our first great sorrow, I remembered the gradual patience And again to the child I whispered, "The snow that husheth all, Darling, the merciful Father Alone can make it fall!" Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her; That my kiss was given to her sister, Folded close under deepening snow. James Russell Lowell [1819-1891] I met a little cottage Girl: She was eight years old, she said: She had a rustic, woodland air, "Sisters and brothers, little Maid, "How many? Seven in all," she said, And wondering looked at me. "And where are they? I pray you tell." She answered, "Seven are we; And two of us at Conway dwell, And two are gone to sea; |