Ah!--that little tear-stained image
Now, is all that's left thee, mother,
Of thy little, dark-eyed daughter!
Ever, as it smiles upon thee
From its tiny case, how keenly
Will thy heart-strings thrill with anguish.
As that voice again comes to thee,
And again those sweet lips murmur--
"Oh it's pretty!--ain't it, ma-ma?"
SANZAS
"Whom have I in heaven but thee?"
'Twere nought to me, yon glorious arch of night,
Decked with the gorgeous blazonry of heaven,
If, to my faith, amid its splendors bright,
No vision of the Eternal One were given;
I could but view a dreary, soulless waste--
A vast expanse of solitude unknown;--
More cheerless for the splendors o'er it cast,
For all its grandeur more intensely lone.
'Twere nought to me, this ever-changing scene
Of earthly beauty, sunshine, and delight--
The wood's deep shadows and the valley's green,
Morn's tender glow, and sunset's splendors bright--
Nought, if my Father smiled not from the sky,
The cloud, the flower, the landscape, and the leaf;
My soul would pine 'mid Earth's vain pageantry,
And droop in hopeless orphanage and grief.
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