THE LOST SPIRIT by CARROLL RYAN

Now in the solitude of night
Oh! tell to me my soul:
Why has that spirit taken flight,
Who was to thee thy one delight
Above the world's control.

She came to thee in early life
A spirit all divine,
And often in the headlong strife,
Where grief, and pain, and death were rife,
Her peace was ever thine.

Upon the tempest-ridden sea
When danger round thee rose,
She seemed to beckon unto thee
From life to immortality,
From labor to repose.

Among the summer islands where
Bright flowers perennial bloom,
She sat beside thee, ever fair,
And with her songs dispell'd the care
That wrapt thee oft in gloom.

But, Oh! my soul, she now has fled
To some more worthy breast;
The happy light her presence shed
Now gathers round a dearer head
Than thine, O! thing unblest!

She was so dear—so very dear—
When she was all thine own,
That now, when she no more is near,
No ruin could be half so drear
As thou, poor soul, alone!

Shall I again thro' summer isles,
Or o'er the wintry sea,
Or in the halls where beauty wiles,
Where laughing phantoms kill with smiles,
Go seek her out for thee?

"Ah, no! thou wilt not find her so,"
My lonely soul replies,
"But if thou would'st the secret know,
Upon some quiet moment go,
And look in Mary's eyes."

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