Mrs. Sarah Josepha Hale (1788–1879)

The Empire of Woman—A Series of Sonnets

THE DAUGHTER from her father’s bosom goes;

The sister drops her brother’s clasping hand;

For God himself ordained a holier band

Than kindred blood on human minds bestows.

That stronger, deeper, dearer tie she knows,

The heart-wed wife; as heaven by rainbow spanned,

Thus bright with hope life’s path before her glows;—

Proves it like mirage on the desert’s sand?

Still in her soul the light divine remains;

And if her husband’s strength be overborne

By sorrow, sickness, or the felon’s chains,

Such as by England’s noblest son were worn,

Unheeding how her own poor heart is torn,

She, angel-like, his sinking soul sustains.