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After the Wedding.


‘ All alone in my room, at last;
I wonder how far they have travelled now?
They'll be very far when the night is past,
And so would I, if I knew but how,
How lovely she looked in her wreath and dress!
She is queenlier far than the village girls;
Those were roses, too, in the wreath, I guess
I were they made the crimson among her curious

She's good as beautiful, too, they say
Her heart is as gentle as any down
She'll be all to him that she can
Dear! I am first ing my new whits stories
how calm she is with her saint-like face,
Her eyes are violet, mine are blue;
How careless I am with my mother's lace!
Her hands are whiter, and softer, too.

They've gone to the city beyond the bill.
They must never come back to this place again!
I'm almost afraid to be her so still.
I wish it would thunder! and lightning! and rain!
Oh, no, for some may not be abed.
Some few, perhaps, may be out to night,
I hope that the menu will come instead,
And heaven be starry, and earth all light.

Tis only a summer that she's been here
It's been my home for seventeen years!
But her name is a testament for and near,
And the poor have embalmed it in priceless ears
I remember the day wish another came
There at last, I have tied my hair--
Her cures and mine were nearly the same,
But her's are longer, and mine less hair.

They're gone across the sea, I know--
Across the ocean — will that be far?--
Did I have my comb a moment ago?
I seem to forget where my things all are
When ships are wrecked, do the people drown!
Is there never a boat to save the crew?
Poor ships! It ever my ship goes down,
I'll want a grave in the ocean, too.

Good night, good night!--it strikes one!
Good night to bride, and good night to groom.
The light of my can it's to almost done.
I wish my bed was in mother's room.
How calm it looks in the midnight shade--
Those curtains were hung there clean to-day;
They're all too white for me, I'm afraid.
Perhaps I may soon be as white as they.

Dark!--all dark — for the light is dead.
Father in Heaven, may I have rest?
One hour of sleep for my weary head--
For this breaking heart in my poor, poor breast.
For his sweet sake, do I kneel and pray.
Oh, God, protect him from change and ill,
And render worthier every way,
The older, the purer, the lovelier still.

There — I knew I was going to cry--
I have kept the tears in my soul too long;
Oh, let me say it, or I shall die,
As Heaven is witness, I mean not wrong.
He never shell hear from his secret room.
He never shall know in the after years.
How seventeen summers of happy bloom;
Fell dead one night, in a moment of tears.

I loved him more than she understands--
For him I loaded my soul with truth,
For him I am kneeling, with lifted hands,
To lay at his feet my shattered youth;
I love, I adore him, still the same;
More than father, and mother, and life!
My hope of hopes was to bear his name,
My heaven of heavens to be his wife!

His wife — ob, name which the angels breathe,
Let it not crimson my cheek for sham--
Tis her great glory, her word to wreathe
In the princely heart from whose blood it came,
Oh, hush! again I behold them at and,
As they stood, to-night, by the chancel wall;
I see him holding her white gloved hand,
I hear his voice in a whisper fall.

I see the minister's silver hair.
I see him kneel at the altar stone,
I see him rise when the preyers is r,
He has taken their hands and meds them one,
The fathers and mothers are standing near,
The friends are pressing to kiss the bride;
One of those kisses had birth place here--
The dew of her lips has not yet died.

His lips have touched her's before to night--
Then I have a grain of his to keep!
This midnight blackness is flecked with light,
Some angel is singing my soul to sleep.
He knows full well why many a knave
So close to his lady's lips should swim--
God only knows that the kiss I gave
Was set in her mouth to give to him!

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