AN ANGEL with a radiant face, | |
Above a cradle bent to look, | |
Seemed his own image there to trace, | |
As in the waters of a brook. | |
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Dear child! who me resemblest so, | 5 |
It whispered, come, oh come with me! | |
Happy together let us go, | |
The earth unworthy is of thee! | |
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Here none to perfect bliss attain; | |
The soul in pleasure suffering lies; | 10 |
Joy hath an undertone of pain, | |
And even the happiest hours their sighs. | |
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Fear doth at every portal knock; | |
Never a day serene and pure | |
From the oershadowing tempests shock | 15 |
Hath made the morrows dawn secure. | |
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What, then, shall sorrows and shall fears | |
Come to disturb so pure a brow? | |
And with the bitterness of tears | |
These eyes of azure troubled grow? | 20 |
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Ah no! into the fields of space, | |
Away shalt thou escape with me; | |
And Providence will grant thee grace | |
Of all the days that were to be. | |
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Let no one in thy dwelling cower, | 25 |
In sombre vestments draped and veiled; | |
But let them welcome thy last hour, | |
As thy first moments once they hailed. | |
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Without a cloud be there each brow; | |
There let the grave no shadow cast; | 30 |
When one is pure as thou art now, | |
The fairest day is still the last. | |
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And waving wide his wings of white, | |
The angel, at these words, had sped | |
Towards the eternal realms of light! | 35 |
Poor mother! see, thy son is dead! | |
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