Poems (Trask)/One of Life's Mistakes

by Clara Augusta Jones Trask

ONE OF LIFE'S MISTAKES.

I take the truth home to my heart, and stand
Helpless, like one the tide bears from the land,
The happy land, where dwell his household band.

Self-blinded I have been; no cruel blame
Shall fall on her who nobly bears my name;
No thought of mine shall stain her spotless fame.

The bright-eyed stars in summer nights that shine,
The purple grape before 'tis changed to wine,—
No purer are than this pure wife of mine.

She charmed me like some painting rare and old,
My soul twined round her, sinuous fold on fold;
But I was proud and kept my love untold.

I tried to stifle what I felt, and said
I'd starve my passion till its roots were dead,—
For I was poor, and she was nobly bred.

But love is strong, and like the mighty sea,
Which dashes helpless vessels on the lee,
It burst the bounds I set, and conquered me.

I took her hand in mine one summer day,—
She met my look, and did not turn away:
Her blue eye's sadness haunts me still alway.

Had she but told me she had loved before,—
That through some sad mistake the dream was o'er,
And that her heart was dead for evermore!

I fondly thought no other lips had pressed
The red of hers; I thought her quiet breast
Had never held another head to rest.

I smoothed her dainty fingers white as snow,
And watched her face to see her pale cheek glow,
And thought no other man had touched her so.

Oh, those were days stolen from Heaven's delights!
I walked on flowers, and trod enchanted heights,
Whose airs were balm, whose walls were chrysolites.

She smiles upon me now, and keeps away
From him, because she minds her vows alway;
And unto me she gave herself for aye.

He came among us, handsome, frank, and free;
His manly beauty strangely won on me,—
Ah! had I seen th' inevitable To-Be!

I saw them when they met. She grew as white
As graveyard marble, in the cold moonlight,
That through the oriel window fell so bright.

He touched her fingers; bowed his stately head;
I saw his swart cheek flush with burning red,
And she—the royal woman I had wed—

She turned from him with fine, exquisite scorn,
E'en while her brow glowed like the brow of morn;
And I stole out, and wished myself unborn!

He flirts and trifles with the gay young girls,—
Admires their eyes, and twines their pretty curls,
And tells them that their teeth are like white pearls.

But when he meets her, all the nobler sense
Of his starved soul flames up in power intense!
Well, who knows what may be a century hence?

They both are noble. Both remember me;
And go their separate ways all silently,
Hiding the lack that ne'er will cease to be.

Their story is a simple one to tell,—
What is more simple than a funeral knell?
They loved each other, and they both loved well.

She thought him false; her purse-proud friends helped on
The sad delusion; gold his love had won;
And she was proud, and faith was all undone!

Well, I shall live my life out by her side;
Feeling, with all my bitter grief, some pride
That she will fall not, though she be sore tried.