Think Not Less
I Love Thee
The following is a gem of the purest water. We seldom find anything more beautiful. It is truly refreshing to meet with something genuine in these times of miserable sham and pretension.
Oh, think not less I love thee,
That our paths are parted now –
For the stars that burn above thee,
Are not truer than my vow.
As the fragrance to the blossom,
As the moon unto the night,
Our love is to my bosom –
Its sweetness and its light.
Oh, think not less I love thee,
That thy hand I thus resign –
In the Heaven that bends above thee,
I will claim thee yet as mine.
Through the vision of Life’s morning.
Ever fitted one, like thee –
And thou, Life’s [lips] adorning,
Shalt hence that vision be.
—W.D. Gallagher
We Never
Talk in French
Oh! no, we never talk in French,
Its sound no more is heard;
Our lips are now forbid to speak
The smallest foreign word:
I cannot say – ‘Mon cher ami,
Comment vous portez vous?’
Nor he reply – ‘Tres bien mon ange.’
Oh! no, it would not do.
I dare not sigh – ‘Pensez a moi’ –
Or ‘Soyez vous fidele?’
Nor can he say – ‘Toujours a toi’
Or – ‘Au revoir, ma belle’ –
And if ‘Ne m’oubliez pas,’ slips out,
It will, ere I’m aware –
‘They’re talking French,’ is screamed about
Ere I can add – ‘Mon cher.’
And ‘m’aimez vous’ – I never hear,
Nor dare he ever say
‘Jusqu’a la mort’ – so much we fear
To parlen en Francais.
All ears are open when he sits
Beside me after tea,
Lest he should say – ‘Acceptez moi’
And I should answer – ‘Oui.’
I Think of Thee
I think of thee when morning wakes,
With rosy dances on the sea,
And startled day in rapture breaks
In golden jets – I think of thee!
When human discord mist-like floats
With Nature’s song from earth and sea,
As mid a storm soft silver notes,
In music comes – I think of thee!
I think of thee when aired eve,
Sinks bird-like to its dewy rest,
And soft and fair the moonbeams leave
Their crystal lines adawn the west.
When troubled thoughts, a raging storm
Arise like tempest on the sea,
Soft from afar a gliding form
The tempest calms – I think of thee!
–H.J.H.
He is Another’s Now
They say he is another’s now,
That I no more his smile shall see,
Oh! say not so – he would not break
The solemn vow he pledged to me
They tell me like the diamond’s ray,
Her love lit eyes upon him shine –
Can be forget those sacred hours,
When every prayer he breathed was mine?
They say he is another’s now –
Oh, no! his love is mine alone –
If not my lips, speak not my tears,
This breaking heart his own – his own!
They tell me that he still is gay,
And that he never lisps my name –
Can he forget the face that smiled
So dear a welcome when he came?
They say he is another’s now,
Whose witching tones delight his ear –
hate he forgot his favorite airs,
I used to sing when he was near?
They tell me he no more will come,
Nor at the door his step be heart –
Can he forget our moonlight walks,
The sweet embrace, the parting word?
They say he is another’s now –
My heart is like a cherished flower,
Which not till crush’d around the vase,
Its long imprisoned sweets with showers.
Can he forget when first it bloomed,
In all love’s primrose colours drest,
When plucking it from where it grew,
He nursed it gently in his breast.
They say he is another’s now –
And I a poor forgotten thing;
Oh no, oh no! he bade me wear
For his dear sake this treasured ring.
They do but jest who say his lips
Another’s cheeks have press’d than mine –
Can he forget the garden bower,
The kiss behind the trellis’d vain?
—From the New York Mirror
To the Beloved
I am close beside thee, dearest,
Bound me are thy white arms thrown;
‘Tis my beating heart thou hearest,
Dearest beating with thine own. –
Yet ah me! a cloud is dimming,
Thy bright soul with shadowy fears –
And thy bright eyes now are swimming,
Brimming with their gushing tears.
Tell me dear one why thou mournest –
Canst thou doubt my love for thee?
Can I doubt that thou returnest
Earnest trusting love for me?
‘Tis no dream of poets musing
That one mingled souls we teach;
For our lives we are transferring
Losing each ones soul in each.
In the well depths of our feeling –
In the home of endless truth –
We have hushed our loves revealing,
Sealing its eternal youth.
Twine thine arms my love around me –
Lay thy bosom close to mine!
I thank God that thou hast bound me,
Bound me in this love as thine!
—Duganne
Song of the
Sordid Sweetheart
I Loved thee for thy money,
For wealth, they said was thine;
But, finding thou has none,
Thy heart and hand resign,
Think not I wish to pain thee,
Deem not I use the ill:
I like thee; - but maintain thee,
I neither can nor will.
I thought thee quite a treasure –
A bona fide sum,
And dreamt of joy and pleasure
That never were to come:
The house – the hounds – the horses –
Thy fortune would not allow;
The wines – the dozen courses;
That dream is over now!
Not for they charms I wooed thee,
Though thou wast passing fair;
Nor for thy mind I sued thee,
Though stored with talents rare:
Thine income ‘twas that caught me –
For that I held thee dear;
I trusted thoud’st have brought me
Five thousand pounds a year.
That hope, alas! is blighted,
Thereon I will not dwell;
I should have been delighted
To wed thee – but, farewell!
My feelings let me smother,
Hard though the struggle be,
And try and find another,
Rich as I fancied thee.
Kindred Hearts
Oh! ask not, hope thou not too much
Of sympathy below;
Few are the hearts whence one same touch
Bids the sweet fountain flow;
Few – and by still conflicting powers
Forbidden here to meet –
Such ties would make this life of ours
Too fair for aught so fleet.
It may be that thy brother’s eye,
Sees not as thine, which terns
In such deep reverence to the sky,
Where the rich sunset burns
It may be that the breath of spring,
Borne amidst violets lone,
A rapture o’er they should can bring
A dream, to his unknown.
The tune that speaks of other times -
A sorrowful delight!
The melody of distant chimes,
The sound of waves by night;
The wind, that with so many a tone,
Some chord within can thrill –
these may have language all thine own
To him a mystery still.
Yet scorn thou not for this, the true
And steadfast love of years;
The kindly, that from childhood grew,
The faithful to thy tears!
If there be one that o’er the dead,
Hath in thy grief borne pact,
And watch’d through sickness by thy bed
Call his a kindred heart!
But for those bonds all perfect made
Wherein bright spirits blend,
Like sister flowers of one sweet shade,
With the same breeze that bend
For that full bliss of thought allied,
Never to mortals given
Oh! lay thy lovely dreams aside,
Or lift them unto heaven.
The Bridegroom
to his Bride
Four years ago, dear love!
And we were strangers; in a distant land
Long had it been my lonely lot to rove;
And I had never touched that gentle hand,
Or looked into the luster of those eyes,
Or heard that voice of lovely melodies,
Winning its way unto the listener’s heart,
And gladdening it, as a fresh stream doth part
The grass and flowers, and beautifies its road
With fresher hues, by its sweet tides bestowed.
Then I had never heard that name of thine,
Which on this blessed day hath merged in mine.
Three years ago, mine own,
And we had met – ‘twas but acquaintanceship;
There was no tremor in the courteous tone,
Which greeting thee, flowed freely to my lip
At each new interview. Thy beauty seemed
Indeed the very vision I had dreamed
Of woman’s loveliest form; but that it shined
So bright a gem, so true and pure a mind,
I did not early learn; for thou art one
Whose gentle, kindly actions ever slain
The glare of day. I knew not then the power,
That seems thy richest gift at this blest hour.
Another year went by,
And we were friends! dear friends we called each other,
We said our bosoms throbbed in sympathy,
That we were like a sister and a brother
Ah! but do brothers’ hearths thrill through each chord,
At a dear sister’s smile or gracious word?
Do sisters blush, and strive the blush to hide,
When a fond brother lingers at their side?
Do friends, and nothing more, shrink from surmise;
And dread to meet the keen world’s strutinies,
And tremble with a vague and groundless shame,
And start when each doth hear the other’s name?
One little year ago,
And we were lovers – lovers pledged and vowed –
The unsealed fountains of our hearts might flow;
Our summer happiness had scarce a cloud.
We smiled to think upon the dubious past,
How could so long our self-delusion last?
We laughed at our own fears, whole dim array
One spoken word of Love had put away.
In love’s full blessed confidence we talked,
We heeded not who watched us as we walked;
And day by day hath that affection grown,
Until this happy morn that makes us one.
Beloved! ‘tis the day,
The summer day, to which our hearts have turned,
As to a haven that before them lay,
A haven dim and distantly discerned.
Now we have reached it, and our onward gaze
Must henceforth be beyond earth’s fleeting days,
Unto a better hope, when having loved
One more than e’er each other – having proved
Faithful to Him, and faithful to the vow,
That in our hearts is echoing even now,
We two shall dwell His glorious throne before,
With souls, not bound, but blended evermore.
A Courting Song
The parlors both are occupied,
And every other spot,
By couples who a courting seem –
And yet perhaps they’re not.
There are some that court on tabourets,
Placed lovingly together,
And lovingly they whisper low
Of fashions or the weather;
Some court within the vestibule
And some upon the stairs,
And many court on ottomans,
And very few on chairs.
And openly, without disguise,
Is all the courting done,
No matter whether on it shines
The gas-light or the sun;
And so desirous are they still
The state of things to prove,
The more that visitors come in,
The more they will not move.
But there they sit and persevere,
In spite of hint and glance,
And people that on business come,
Have very little chance.
And some court at the checker board,
While others court at chess,
(Though chess players cannot be in love
So much as they profess.)
There are some at back-gammon court,
Half hid behind a column
And some would even court at whist
Were not the game so solemn;
There are some that promenade as if
They never meant to stop,
And some think it policy
To institute a hop.
This courting of the young folks
Is a pretty sight to see.
But the courting of the married ones
Had better never be,
Success to all whose hearts are fixed
On objects right and true;
We wish with them, that they could make
A shorter courtship do.
I’m always glad when any friend
Invites me out to tea
For ‘tis very dull to stay at home
With no one courting me.
—Miss Leslie
Young Lady’s Choice
Give me the man that’s learned without pretence
Blest with good nature and with common sense;
Whose noble, generous, understanding heart
Disdains to act a mean, dissembling part;
Who once from virtue’s path has never strayed,
Deceived no fair one, nor a friend betrayed;
Where virtue rules with an unbounded away
Then sense and reason prompts one to obey
Such be the man with whom I’d spend my life,
Or never let me own the name wife!
Pensez a Moi
O, think of me when blushing Morn,
With kisses wakes the sleeping flowers,
And wild birds break, with a gush of song,
The dreamy silence of the bowers.
O, think of me when Evening comes,
And kindly veils the glare of day, -
Dismissing Labor from its task,
And calling Childhood from its play.
And think of me when dark-robed Night,
Light scatters from her jewelled vest;
I’ll gaze with thee on that “lone star,”
Which crowns the mountains of the West.
Unless some Lethe o’er me sweep
Light of my Life, I’ll think of thee,
And well I know, true hearted one,
I know that thou wilt – think of me.
—Eugene
