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LINES, WRITTEN AT MIDNIGHT, IN THE PROSPECT OF A BEREAVEMENT, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Though to the passing world my heart
Last Line: Its healing to the self-same god!
Subject(s): Mourning; Bereavement


Though to the passing world my heart
A quiet, untouched thing may seem,
It bleeds, my Mother, bleeds for thee,
My love, my sorrow, and my theme.

How many a night hese aching eyes
Have watched beside thy wasting form;
Watched, like the anxious mariner,
Who marks and dreads the coming storm!

How many a time I've bent mine ear,
To catch thy low and fainting breath;
And trembled, lest thy soul had fled
Unnoticed to the realms of death!

My Mother! thou wilt die, and leave
The world, with life and grief to me;
But ah! perchance the branch may fade,
When severed from its parent tree!

I do adore thee! such my first
Fond broken lisping did proclaim;
And all I suffer now but proves
My shrine and homage still the same.

Time, that will alter breast and brow
So strangely that we know them not;
That sponges out all trace of truth,
Or darkens it with many a blot;

In me hath wrought its changes too,
Alike in bosom, lip, and brain;
And taught me much, much that, alas!
Is learnt but in the school of pain.

I'm strangely warped from what I was,
For some few years, in Life's fresh morn;
When Thought scarce linked with Reason's chain,
Nor dare to question, doubt, or scorn.

The poisoned smile, the broken faith,
Of those I fondly deemed sincere,
Have almost taught me how to hate,
And echo back the gibe and jeer.

Though young in years, I've learnt to look
With trustless eye on all and each;
And shudder that I find so oft
The basest heart with gentlest speech.

But one warm stream of feeling flows
With warm devoted love for thee;
A stream whose tide, without an ebb,
Will reach eternity's vast sea.

Time has not dimmed, nor will it dim,
One ray of that bright glowing flame
Which constant burns, like Allah's fire,
Upon the altar of thy name.

But, ah! that name, so dearly prized,
So warmly cherished, soon must be
A beacon quenched; a treasure wrecked --
To live but in the memory.

Father of Mercy! is there naught
Of tribulation thou canst send
Upon my heart but this dire stroke;
To scathe, to madden, and to rend?

Wilt Thou not spare, at least awhile,
The only one I care to call
My own? Oh, wilt thou launch the bolt,
And crush at once my earthly all?

But this is impious. -- Faith and hope
Will teach me how to bear my lot!
To think Almighty Wisdom best;
To bow my head, and murmur not.

The chast'ning hand of one above
Falls heavy; but I'll kiss the rod:
He gives the wound, and I must trust
Its healing to the self-same God!





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