ON THE DEATH OF IDA by DAVID MACBETH MOIR

I.

'Tis midnight deep; the full, round moon,
As 'twere a spectre, walks the sky;
The balmy breath of gentlest June
Just stirs the stream that murmurs by:
Above me frowns the solemn wood;
Nature, methinks, seems Solitude
Embodied to the eye.

II.

Yes, 'tis a season and a scene,
Ida, to think on thee: the day,
With stir and strife, may come between
Affection and thy beauty's ray;
But feeling here assumes control,
And mourns my desolated soul
That thou art rapt away!

III.

Thou wert a rainbow to my sight,
The storms of life before thee fled;
The glory and the guiding light
That onward cheered and upward led;
From boyhood to this very hour,
For me, and only me, thy flower
Its fragrance seemed to shed.

IV.

Dark though the world for me might show
Its sordid faith and selfish gloom,
Yet, 'mid life's wilderness, to know
For me that sweet flower shed its bloom,
Was joy, was solace—thou art gone—
And hope forsook me, when the stone
Sank darkly o'er thy tomb.

V.

And art thou dead? I dare not think
That thus the solemn truth can be;
And broken is the only link
That chain'd youth's pleasant thoughts to me!
Alas! that thou couldst know decay—
That, sighing, I should live to say,
"The cold grave holdeth thee!"

VI.

For me thou shon'st, as shines a star,
Lonely, in clouds when heaven is lost;
Thou wert my guiding light afar,
When on misfortune's billows tost:
Now darkness hath obscured that light,
And I am left, in rayless night,
On Sorrow's lowering coast.

VII.

And art thou gone? I deemed thee some
Immortal essence—art thou gone?
I saw thee laid within the tomb,
And I am left to mourn alone:
Once to have loved is to have loved
Enough; and what with thee I proved,
Again I'll seek in none.

VIII.

Earth in thy sight grew faëry land;
Life was Elysium—thought was love—
When, long ago, hand clasped in hand,
We roamed through Autumn's twilight grove;
Or watched the broad uprising moon
Shed, as it were, a wizard noon,
The blasted heath above.

IX.

Farewell!—and must I say farewell?—
No—thou wilt ever be to me
A present thought; thy form shall dwell
In love's most holy sanctuary;
Thy voice shall mingle with my dreams,
And haunt me when the shot-star gleams
Above the rippling sea.

X.

Never revives the past again;
But still thou art, in lonely hours,
To me earth's heaven, the azure main,
Soft music, and the breath of flowers;
My heart shall gain from thee its hues;
And Memory give, though truth refuse,
The bliss that once was ours!

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