But hence such thoughts!--nor let me grieve
O'er scenes of joy that I but leave,
As the bird quits awhile its nest
To come again with livelier zest.
And now to tell thee--what I fear
Thou'lt gravely smile at--_why_ I'm here
Tho' thro' my life's short, sunny dream,
I've floated without pain or care
Like a light leaf down pleasure's stream,
Caught in each sparkling eddy there;
Tho' never Mirth awaked a strain
That my heart echoed not again;
Yet have I felt, when even most gay,
Sad thoughts--I knew not whence or why--
Suddenly o'er my spirit fly,
Like clouds that ere we've time to say
"How bright the sky is!" shade the sky.
Sometimes so vague, so undefined
Were these strange darkenings of my mind--
"While naught but joy around me beamed
So causelessly they've come and flown,
That not of life or earth they seemed,
But shadows from some world unknown.
More oft, however, 'twas the thought
How soon that scene with all its play
Of life and gladness must decay--
Those lips I prest, the hands I caught--
Myself--the crowd that mirth had brought
Around me--swept like weeds away!
This thought it was that came to shed
O'er rapture's hour its worst alloys;
And close as shade with sunshine wed
Its sadness with my happiest joys.
Oh, but for this disheartening voice
Stealing amid our mirth to say
That all in which we most rejoice
Ere night may be the earthworm's prey--
_But_ for this bitter--only this--
Full as the world is brimmed with bliss,
And capable as feels my soul
Of draining to its dregs the whole,
I should turn earth to heaven and be,
If bliss made Gods, a Deity?
Thou know'st that night--the very last
That 'mong my Garden friends I past--
When the School held its feast of mirth
To celebrate our founder's birth.
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