Page:Poems Douglas.djvu/168

Ah! what, I sighed, holds life that's worth pursuing?
 Surely existence seems a drear mistake;
That, that we would not, we are ever doing,
 Walking in slumber till some peril wake.
Finding the pathway of our blind selection
 Lost 'neath the darkness of the midnight skies;
Groping for outlet in each drear direction,
 Mourning life's one spring tide we did not prize.

Casting each rueful glance o'er moments wasted,
 In reaching fruit the far off branches bore;
Grasping the promised pleasure which, when tasted,
 Proved but the apples of the Dead Sea shore.
Alas! and is the gall and acid blended—
 The weary wanderings, disappointments, strife,
And vain regret?—all can be comprehended
 In the brief thing we fondly cling to—Life.

The morn's rich beams a roseate light was throwing
 O'er autumn's robe of richly varied hue,
The waving trees in green and gold were glowing,
 Glittering with gems of ruby tinted dew.
The wind-woke music of the leaves resembled
 The gentlest murmurs of far-distant seas,
As if a requiem on the glad air trembled
 For those borne earthward by the passing breeze.

Yet all around joy's spirit was prevailing,
 Whilst hope found rapturous and exulting wing,
And faith looked upward to that source unfailing
 For many a bliss, ere other leaves should spring.