Henry Abbey. Stories in Verse
Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, storm and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was made using scans of public domain works from the University of Michigan Digital Libraries.)
STORIES IN VERSE.
BY
HENRY ABBEY.
The sense of the world is short-
To love and be beloved.
EMERSON.
NEW YORK:
A. D. F. RANDOLPH &CO., PUBLISHERS,
COR. BROADWAY AND NINTH STREET.
1869.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by
HENRY L. ABBEY,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of
New York.
RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:
PRINTED BY H. O. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY.
TO
RICHARD GRANT WHITE,
WITH GRATITUDE FOR HIS FRIENDSHIP, AND WITH ADMIRATION FOR HIS ELEGANT
SCHOLARSHIP.
BLANCHE: AN EXHALATION FROM WITHERED VIOLETS.
I. THE VENDER OF VIOLETS.
"Violets! Violets! Violets!"
This was the cry I heard
As I passed through the street of a city;
And quickly my heart was stirred
To an incomprehensible pity,
At the undertone of the cry;
For it seemed like the voice of one
Who was stricken, and all undone,
Who was only longing to die.
"Violets! Violets! Violets!"
The voice came nearer still.
"Surely," I said, "it is May,
And out on valley and hill,
The violets blooming to-day,
Send this invitation to me
To come and be with them once more;
I know they are dear as can be,
And I hate the town with its roar."
"Violets! Violets! Violets!"
Children of sun and of dew,
Flakes of the blue of the sky,
There is somebody calling to you
Who seems to be longing to die;
Yet violets are so sweet
They can scarcely have dealings with death.
Can it be, that the dying breath,
That comes from the one last beat
Of a true heart, turns to the flowers?
"Violets! Violets! Violets!"
The crier is near me at last.
With my eyes I am holding her fast.
She is a lovely seller of flowers.
She is one whom the town devours
In its jaws of bustle and strife.
How poverty grinds down a life;
For, lost in the slime of a city,
What is a beautiful face?
Few are they who have pity
For loveliness in disgrace.
Yet she that I hold with my eyes,
Who seems so modest and wise,
Has not yet fallen, I am sure.
She has nobly learned to endure.
Large, and mournful, and meek,
Her eyes seem to drink from my own.
Her curls are carelessly thrown
Back from white shoulder and cheek;
And her lips seem strawberries, lost
In some Arctic country of frost.
The slightest curve on a face,
May give an expression unmeet;
Yet hers is so perfect and sweet,
And shaped with such delicate grace,
Its loveliness is complete.
"Violets! Violets! Violets!"
I hear the cry once more;
But not as I heard it before.
It whispers no more of death;
But only of odorous breath,
And modest flowers, and life.
I purchased a cluster, so rife
With the touch of her tapering hand,
I seem to hold it in mine.
I would I could understand,
Why a touch seems so divine.
II. A FLOWER FOUND IN THE STREET.
To-day in passing down the street,
I found a flower upon the walk,
A dear syringa, white and sweet,
Wrung idly from the missing stalk.
And something in its odor speaks
Of dark brown eyes, and arms of snow,
And rainbow smiles on sunset cheeks-
The maid I saw a month ago.
I waited for her many a day,
On the dear ground where first we met;
I sought her up and down the way,
And all in vain I seek her yet.
Syringa, naught your odor tells,
Or whispers so I cannot hear;
Speak out, and tell me where she dwells,
In perfume accents, loud and clear.
Shake out the music of your speech,
In quavers of delicious breath;
The conscious melody may teach
A lover where love wandereth.
If so you speak, with smile and look,
You will not wither, but endure;
And in my heart's still open book,
Keep your white petals ever pure.
If so you speak, upon her breast
You yet may rest, nor sigh afar;
But in the moonlight's silver dressed,
Seem 'gainst your heaven the evening star.
III. ODYLE.
We know that they are often near
Of whom we think, of whom we talk,
Though we have missed them many a year,
And lost them from our daily walk.
Some strange clairvoyance dwells in all,
And webs the souls of human kind.
I would that I could learn its thrall,
And know the power of mind on mind.
I then might quickly use the sense,
To find where one I worship dwells,
If in the city, or if thence
Among the breeze-rung lily bells.
IV. WHAT ONE FINDS IN THE COUNTRY.
I went out in the country
To spend an idle day-
To see the flowers in blossom,
And scent the fragrant hay.
The dawn's spears smote the mountains
Upon their shields of blue,
And space, in her black valleys,
Joined in the conflict too.
The clouds were jellied amber;
The crickets in the grass
Blew pipe and hammered tabor,
And laughed to see me pass.
The cows down in the pasture,
The mowers in the field,
The birds that sang in heaven,
Their happiness revealed.
My heart was light and joyful,
I could not answer why;
And I thought that it was better
Always to smile than sigh.
How could I hope to meet her
Whom most I wished to meet?
If always I had lost her,
Then life were incomplete.
The road ran o'er a brooklet;
Upon the bridge she stood,
With wild flowers in her ringlets,
And in her hand her hood.
The morn laid on her features
An envious golden kiss;
She might have fancied truly,
I longed to share its bliss.
I said, "O, lovely maiden,
I have sought you many a day.
That I love you, love you, love you,
Is all that I can say."
Her mournful eyes grew brighter,
And archly glanced, though meek.
A bacchanalian dimple
Dipt a wine-cup in her cheek.
"If you love me, love me, love me,
If you love me as you say,
You must prove it, prove it, prove it!"
And she lightly turned away.
V. AN AUNT AND AN UNCLE.
I have but an aunt and an uncle
For kinsfolk on the earth,
And one has passed me unnoticed
And hated me from my birth;
But the first has reared me and taught me,
Whatever I have of worth.
This is my uncle by marriage,
For his wife my aunt had died,
And left him all her possessions,
With much that was mine beside-
'Tis said that he hated her brother,
As much as he loved the bride.
That brother, my father, forgave him,
As his last hour ran its sand,
And begged in return his forgiveness,
As he placed in his sister's hand
The bonds, that when I was twenty,
Should be at my command.