se, like some fond playmate's, to mine own.
Up to that boundary, whence the heart leaps forth
To life, like some wild torrent, when the rains
Pour dark and full upon the cloudy hills,
Thy gentle footsteps wandered near to mine.
Be with me now! Oh, in the starry hush
Of the deep night, that holds the earthly down
In all my nature, bring to me again
The early purity, which kept thy hand
From the entrancing harp it held in Heaven!
Through the warm starting of my hoarded tears,
Let me behold thine eyes divine, as stars
Gleam through the twilight vapors of the sea!

"Not yet hast thou forsaken me. The prayer
Whose crowning fervor lifts my nature up
Midway to God, may still evoke thy form.
Thou hast been with me, when the midnight dew
Clung damp upon my brow, and the broad fields
Stretched far and dim beneath the ghostly moon;
When the dark, awful woods were silent near,
And with imploring hands toward the stars
Clasped in mute yearning, I have questioned Heaven
For the lost language of the book of Life.
Oh, then thy face was glorious, and thy hair
On the white moonbeam floating, veiled thy brow,
But in the holy sadness of thine eye
Which held my spirit, tremblingly I saw,
Through rushing tears, the sign of angel-grief
O'er the false promise of diviner years.
From the far glide of some descending strain
Of tenderest music I have heard thy voice;
And thou hast called amid the stormy rush
Of grand orchestral triumph, with a sound
Resistless in its power. I feel the light,
Which is thine atmosphere, around my soul,
When a great sorrow gulfs it from the world.

"Come back! come back! my heart grows faint, to know
How thy withdrawing radiance leaves more dim
The twilight borders of the night of Earth.
Now when the bitter truth is learned; when all
That seemed so high and good but mocks its seeming--
When the warm dreams of youth come shivering back,
In the cold chambers of the heart to die--
When, with the wrestling years, familiar grows
The merciless hand of pain, desert me not!
Come with the true heart of the faithful Night,
When I have cast away the masquing garb
Of hollow Day, and lain my soul to rest
On her consoling bosom! From the founts
Of thine exhaustless light, make clear the road
Through toil and darkness, i