Not less for this it echoes all the tones of higher skill,
And trembles most with rapture when another's touch can thrill.
For this I love thee, Edith May, thy spirit's voice I hear,
Like the strain of some grand melody resounding in my ear;
And visions rise before my eyes of hosts in armor bound,
And like a voice within a dream, I hear the clarion's sound;
And gorgeous banners broidered o'er with many a strange design,
With burnished lance and waving plume, deck out the shadowy line—
Anon the sunset's crimson cloud is fading o'er the hill,
And the chieftain's farewell bugle-note is sounding sad and shrill;
And standing on the castle wall I see a lady fair,
With pallid face, and waving scarf, and unbound raven hair;
While winding up the distant hill the long defile hath passed,
And the lady on the chief she loved hath fondly looked her last.
All old-time scenes of war and pomp, of love and minstrelsy,
Of kingly sports, and courtly dames, and knightly rivalry;
All by-gone themes once wont to stir the blood of princely men,
Swell my dreaming heart with lofty pride, and the dead past lives again;
And I love thy harp's grand tone that wakes my spirit's high romance,
And praise thee that thou hast for thine this rich inheritance.
I have a sister, Edith May, a sister pure and young,
With a holy heart, and gifted mind, and sweetly eloquent tongue;
And to her I bear a feeling which can have no earthly name,
But our souls are linked, our hearts are joined, and our loves are aye the same;
And a glorious world of dreams have we, a rare poetic world,
Where fancy's restless golden wings are glittering unfurled—
Where love sits like a household form, a dear, familiar thing,
And countless fairy visions float forever on the wing;
And here amid the whispered strains of spirit-minstrelsy,
I listen with my dreaming soul for one wild note from thee.
I have not seen thee, Edith May—they call thy youthful face
The lovely index of the soul, its poetry and grace;
