The Only Daughter

Illustration Of A Picture     They bid me strike the idle strings,     As if my summer days     Had shaken sunbeams from their wings     To warm my autumn lays;     They bring to me their painted urn,     As if it were not time     To lift my gauntlet and to spurn     The lists of boyish rhyme;     And were it not that I have still     Some weakness in my heart     That clings around my stronger will     And pleads for gentler art,     Perchance I had not turned away     The thoughts grown tame with toil,     To cheat this lone and pallid ray,     That wastes the midnight oil.     Alas! with every year I feel     Some roses leave my brow;     Too young for wisdom's tardy seal,     Too old for garlands now.     Yet, while the dewy breath of spring     Steals o'er the tingling air,     And spreads and fans each emerald wing     The forest soon shall wear.     How bright the opening year would seem,     Had I one look like thine     To meet me when the morning beam     Unseals these lids of mine!     Too long I bear this lonely lot,     That bids my heart run wild     To press the lips that love me not,     To clasp the stranger's child.     How oft beyond the dashing seas,     Amidst those royal bowers,     Where danced the lilacs in the breeze,     And swung the chestnut-flowers,     I wandered like a wearied slave     Whose morning task is done,     To watch the little hands that gave     Their whiteness to the sun;     To revel in the bright young eyes,     Whose lustre sparkled through     The sable fringe of Southern skies     Or gleamed in Saxon blue!     How oft I heard another's name     Called in some truant's tone;     Sweet accents! which I longed to claim,     To learn and lisp my own!     Too soon the gentle hands, that pressed     The ringlets of the child,     Are folded on the faithful breast     Where first he breathed and smiled;     Too oft the clinging arms untwine,     The melting lips forget,     And darkness veils the bridal shrine     Where wreaths and torches met;     If Heaven but leaves a single thread     Of Hope's dissolving chain,     Even when her parting plumes are spread,     It bids them fold again;     The cradle rocks beside the tomb;     The cheek now changed and chill     Smiles on us in the morning bloom     Of one that loves us still.     Sweet image! I have done thee wrong     To claim this destined lay;     The leaf that asked an idle song     Must bear my tears away.     Yet, in thy memory shouldst thou keep     This else forgotten strain,     Till years have taught thine eyes to weep,     And flattery's voice is vain;     Oh then, thou fledgling of the nest,     Like the long-wandering dove,     Thy weary heart may faint for rest,     As mine, on changeless love;     And while these sculptured lines retrace     The hours now dancing by,     This vision of thy girlish grace     May cost thee, too, a sigh.