Thomas Wentworth Higginson, John Greenleaf Whittier

[147]

‘ Sacred to thee am I henceforth,
Thou in heaven and I on earth.’

She came and stood by her sister's bed;
‘Hall of the Heron is dead ’ she said.

‘ The winds and the waves their work have done,
We shall see him no more beneath the sun.

‘ Little will reck that heart of thine,
It loved him not with a love like mine.

I for his sake, were he but here,
Could hem and broider thy bridal gear;

‘ Though hands should tremble and eyes be wet,
And stitch for stitch in my heart be set.

‘ But now my soul with his soul I wed;
Thine the living and mine the dead.’

Memories

How thrills once more the lengthening chain
Of memory at the thought of thee I
Old hopes which long in dust have lain,
Old dreams come thronging back again,
And boyhood lives again in me:
I feel its glow upon my cheek.
Its fulness of the heart is mine,
As when I leaned to hear thee speak,
Or raised my doubtful eye to thine.