She was tall;—a queen might wear
Such a proud imperial air;
She was tall, yet when unbound,
Swept her bright hair to the ground,
Glittering like the gold you see
On a young laburnum tree.
Yet her eyes were dark as night,
Melancholy as moonlight,
With the fierce and wilder ray
Of a meteor on its way.
Lonely was her childhood's time,
Lonelier was her maiden prime;
And she wearied of the hours
Wasted in those gloomy towers;
Sometimes through the sunny sky
She would watch the swallows fly,
Making of the air a bath,
In a thousand joyous rings;
She would ask of them their path,
She would ask of them their wings.
Once her stately mother came,
With her dark eye's funeral flame,
And her cheek as pale as death,
And her cold and whispering breath;
With her sable garments bound
By a mystic girdle round,
Which, when to the east she turned,
With a sudden lustre burned.
Once that ladye, dark and tall,
Stood upon the castle wall;
And she marked her daughter's eyes
Fix'd upon the glad sunrise,
With a sad yet eager look,
Such as fixes on a book
Which describes some happy lot,
Lit with joys that we have not.
And the thought of what has been,
And the thought of what might be,
Makes us crave the fancied scene,
And despise reality.
'Twas a drear and desert plain
Lay around their own domain;
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But, far off, a world more fair
Outlined on the sunny air;
Hung amid the purple clouds,
With which early morning shrouds
All her blushes, brief and bright,
Waking up from sleep and night.
In a voice so low and dread,
As a voice that wakes the dead;
Then that stately lady said:
"Daughter of a kingly line,—
"Daughter, too, of race like mine,—
"Such a kingdom had been thine;
"For thy father was a king,
"Whom I wed with word and ring.
"But in an unhappy hour,
"Did he pass my secret bower,—
"Did he listen to the word,
"Mortal ear hath never heard;
"From that hour of grief and pain
"Might we never meet again.
"Maiden, listen to my rede,
"Punished for thy father's deed;
"Here, an exile I must stay,
"While he sees the light of day.
"Child, his race is mixed in thee,
"With mine own more high degree.
"Hadst thou at Christ's altar stood,
"Bathed in His redeeming flood;
"Thou of my wild race had known
"But its loveliness alone.
"Now thou hast a mingled dower,
"Human passion—fairy power.
"But forefend thee from the last:
"Be its gifts behind thee cast.
"Many tears will wash away
"Mortal sin from mortal clay.
"Keep thou then a timid eye
"On the hopes that fill yon sky;
"Bend thou with a suppliant knee,
"And thy soul yet saved may be;—
"Saved by Him who died to save
"Man from death beyond the grave."
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