Poems (Trask)/Two Seasons of Life

by Clara Augusta Jones Trask

TWO SEASONS OF LIFE.

We were children together, he and I:
Oh, beautiful morning! oh, rare, sweet sky!
We roamed together through wood and field,
We drank the honey the wild bees yield;
We crushed the buttercup under our tread,
And its gold dust gilded the daisy's bed;
We sat through sunsets rich and rare,
With our faces lifted, our brown heads bare,
To catch the glory that rippled down
Over the meadow, and river, and town.

We watched the Tuscany roses bloom;
We breathed the hyacinth's faint perfume;
We trampled the clover so lush and sweet,
To find where the strawberries hid from the heat;
And up on the swell of the breezy hills,
We sat through the subtle twilight stills;
And the night-bird sang in the lonesome swamp,
And the full moon lit her blood-red lamp,
And the purple flush of the dear dead day
Faded out of the west, and left it gray.

When the stars came out in the hazy sky,
And the katydid's voice rose clear and high,
And the cricket chirped in the hawthorn hedge,
And the musical river ran o'er the sedge,
And the mist rose white as the winter snow,
And the elms in the breeze swayed to and fro,
We sat together, and hand in hand
We traveled in fancy all dreamland;
Laid gorgeous plans for the coming time,
When the world would be perfect, and life sublime.

We said we would cross the Eastern seas,
Smell India's spices and Araby's breeze;
Talk love together beneath the palms,
Hear Italy's daughters sing vesper psalms;
See sunsets fade from Alpine heights,
From dismal Norway see Northern Lights;
Climb sacred Sinai, and there, in awe,
Behold the land which the prophet saw,
And by Jerusalem's ruined towers
Deplore the wreck of her golden hours.

Oh, 'twas delicious! the rich plantain grew,
And the creamy bananas were wet with the dew;
The amber oriole flashed through the flowers,
And the bulbul sang in the orange bowers,
And beneath the silver light of the stars
We heard the tinkle of soft guitars;
Oh, the royal midnights! the calm, sweet days!
Oh, the languorous noons and the twilight haze!
And the waves rippled lightly of that south sea,
And life was an Eden to him and to me!

Ah! it is over! this world is so cold!
The sunsets are sable! I miss the red gold!
The airs that sweep o'er me are chilly and damp,
The winds o'er the dead leaves relentlessly tramp!
The universe holds, for me, only a grave,
Where the pale lilies bloom, and the green willows wave!
I care not for southlands, or orange, or palm,
I am heedless of Italy's breezes of balm;
For me all the light of this earth is so dim!
Heaven would not be Heaven if absent from him.