Thomas Holley Chivers

“ The years were then to me, Mary!
⁠As hours are now to me;
As time is now to thee, Mary!
⁠In Heaven above to thee.
XI.
For Love knows nought of years, Mary!
⁠Love nothing knows of years;
And sheds no bitter tears, Mary!
⁠Time measured is by tears. ”

“ As graceful as the Babylonian willow Bending, at noontide, over some clear stream In Palestine, in beauty did she seem Upon the cygnet-down of her soft pillow; And now her breast heaved like some gentle billow Swayed by the presence of the full round moon Voluptuous as the summer South at noon Her cheeks as rosy as the radiant dawn When heaven is cloudless! ”

“ Was thy great song, celestial Israfel!
⁠Like that Apollo near the shining portals
⁠Of Heaven, in chariot, with celestial lyre,
⁠Sung for the thronging glorified Immortals,
⁠Which set the souls of all the gods on fire! ”

“ And singing afar in the Realms of the Blest ;
While the living are left by thy cold grave reclining,
And mourning for thee while they long for thy rest---
Left mourning for thee while they long for thy rest! ”

“ Early, bright, transient, chaste as morning dew,
She sparkled, was exhaled, and went to heaven!—Young.
I.
⁠Where is she now?
⁠Oh! Isa! tell me where thou art?
⁠If Death has laid his hand upon thy brow,
⁠Has he not touched my heart? ”

“ But there are some, whose hearts are glad,
Thy darksome reign is o'er,-
Who would not live thine hours again,
For riches of the earth and main;
But joy those days of care and pain,
To them, can come no more. ”

“ The Sower in the spring-time of the year—
Clearing plantations, in thy goings forth,
Amid the wilderness, where all is drear—
Scattering ten thousand giant oaks around,
Like playthings, on the dark, opprobrious ground. ”

“ Is it the soul of her who once was here,
⁠Speaking affection, through thy lips, to me?
II.
Oh! from my childhood this has been to me
⁠A mystery which no one could solve!—It sounds
And sorrows for the Sea incessantly—
⁠Telling the grief with which my soul abounds! ”

“ On the beryl-rimmed rebecs of Ruby,
⁠Brought fresh from the hyaline streams,
She played, on the banks of the Yuba,
⁠Such songs as she heard in her dreams. ”

“ With my beautiful, dutiful Lily Adair.
↑ It was a beautiful Idea of the Greeks that the procreation of beautiful children might be promoted by keeping in their sleeping apartments an Apollo or Hyacinthus. In this way they not only patronised Art, but begat a likeness of their own love. ”