Poems (Hazlett-Bevis)/A Picture
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For works with similar titles, see A Picture.
A Picture.
A dawning day, and hill-top whose brow was flower crowned.
A shimmering sun, a prescience in air,
The perfume of peace, His beauty all around,
The trilling of birds, the glimmer of sea,
The sough of a summer breeze;
Away off yonder, where the hush of a silence mingles,
With a cry that may never cease.
An earnest life, a proud, true heart,
Eyes with the light of the stars;
A winning smile, sweet lips apart,
And a trust that nothing mars;
An extended hand for the book,
Which holds, on its pages fair to see,
A lesson so rife, with the sweets of life
As it seems in a destiny.
An expectant look, a flush of joy,
Feet eager to tread the path;
A restless impulse without alloy,
A beautiful seeming, a something within which hath
An awakening hope—for a toy,
A pause, a listen, a catch in the breath,
As wonderland bursts on the view—
So bright and so fair, so marvelously rare.
Oh, nought but is good, and is true.
A shadow, a cloud, a look as of death,
A sigh for the old, and the new;
A clutch at the blossoms fading beneath,
Which still at the feet, the pathway bestrew,
Like thorns in the weary one's wreath.
A soil on the book, a soil on the page
The hands less firmly hold;
A look as of one grown suddenly sage,
A sorrow's shaft the story told,
And old, but not with age.
A murmur of pain, for the hero troop,
And the ship, Hope, passing by,
An upward glance, for the angel group,
Through the fastly darkening sky;
Eventide coming on apace,
Clouds hurrying, scurrying by;
A look of woe on the ghastly face,
A pitiful, anguished, desolate cry,
As a hand looms forth to trace
The lines of a life that knew no sin,
Written in words of gold
On tablets so clear that the light within
Streams over the letters bold.
There are looming rocks by the weird sea-side,
An ominous flapping of wings,
And croak of gulls, as the winds they ride,
Eerie like flitting the tide.
Worn and weary and darkened the life,
And the night as well; a chill
And terrible mental strife
And battle with doubtful will.
Finished—the book lying low and torn
As thrown by a ruthless hand;
A murmur of winds through caverns worn
By the wear of the wide sea sand;
Just this—and the wash of fretted waves.
A moan in the heart none may hear.
There may be something which sometimes saves
The wreck of a life so drear.
A shimmering sun, a prescience in air,
The perfume of peace, His beauty all around,
The trilling of birds, the glimmer of sea,
The sough of a summer breeze;
Away off yonder, where the hush of a silence mingles,
With a cry that may never cease.
An earnest life, a proud, true heart,
Eyes with the light of the stars;
A winning smile, sweet lips apart,
And a trust that nothing mars;
An extended hand for the book,
Which holds, on its pages fair to see,
A lesson so rife, with the sweets of life
As it seems in a destiny.
An expectant look, a flush of joy,
Feet eager to tread the path;
A restless impulse without alloy,
A beautiful seeming, a something within which hath
An awakening hope—for a toy,
A pause, a listen, a catch in the breath,
As wonderland bursts on the view—
So bright and so fair, so marvelously rare.
Oh, nought but is good, and is true.
A shadow, a cloud, a look as of death,
A sigh for the old, and the new;
A clutch at the blossoms fading beneath,
Which still at the feet, the pathway bestrew,
Like thorns in the weary one's wreath.
A soil on the book, a soil on the page
The hands less firmly hold;
A look as of one grown suddenly sage,
A sorrow's shaft the story told,
And old, but not with age.
A murmur of pain, for the hero troop,
And the ship, Hope, passing by,
An upward glance, for the angel group,
Through the fastly darkening sky;
Eventide coming on apace,
Clouds hurrying, scurrying by;
A look of woe on the ghastly face,
A pitiful, anguished, desolate cry,
As a hand looms forth to trace
The lines of a life that knew no sin,
Written in words of gold
On tablets so clear that the light within
Streams over the letters bold.
There are looming rocks by the weird sea-side,
An ominous flapping of wings,
And croak of gulls, as the winds they ride,
Eerie like flitting the tide.
Worn and weary and darkened the life,
And the night as well; a chill
And terrible mental strife
And battle with doubtful will.
Finished—the book lying low and torn
As thrown by a ruthless hand;
A murmur of winds through caverns worn
By the wear of the wide sea sand;
Just this—and the wash of fretted waves.
A moan in the heart none may hear.
There may be something which sometimes saves
The wreck of a life so drear.