FROM AN EMIGRANT TO HIS ABSENT WIFE

If thou wert here, these tears were tears of light!

But from as sweet a vision did I start

As ever made these eyes grow idly bright!

And though I weep, yet still around my heart

A sweet and playful tenderness doth linger,

Touching my heart as with an infant's finger.

My mouth half open, like a witless man,

I saw our couch, I saw our quiet room,

Its shadows heaving by the fire-light gloom;

And o'er my lips a subtle feeling ran,

All o'er my lips a soft and breeze-like feeling —

I know not what — but had the same been stealing

Upon a sleeping mother's lips, I guess

It would have made the loving mother dream

That she was softly bending down to kiss

Her babe, that something more than babe did seem,

A floating presence of its darling father,

And yet its own dear baby self far rather!

Across my chest there lay a weight, so warm!

As if some bird had taken shelter there;

And lo! I seemed to see a woman's form —

Thine, Sara, thine? O joy, if thine it were!

I gazed with stifled breath, and feared to stir it,

No deeper trance e'er wrapt a yearning spirit!

And now, when I seemed sure thy face to see,

Thy own dear self in our own quiet home;

There came an elfish laugh, and wakened me:

‘ Twas Frederic, who behind my chair had clomb,

And with his bright eyes at my face was peeping.

I blessed him, tried to laugh, and fell a-weeping!