POETRY.
A DEATHBED: JULY lsr, 18—. THIS is the very room in which she died : I know it well; and when the moonlight falls, As now it falls, upon her little bed,
How white the bed looks—like her own frail form When she was dying!
Yet she did not die By moonlight, like our leader, Tennyson: He, after so much waiting, so much grief And glory, and such happiest renown Of blessing others as himself was blest, And making sorrow fruitfuller than joy, He, with the milder radiance round his head, Passed to that gracious Country whence he came. But she went thither on a summer's morn; Round her fair dwelling all the garden rang With songs of birds, and fragrant odours breathed From many a flower to soothe her, and the sun Lighted her onward to that place of rest Wherein her husband stood awaiting her.
She did not say a word, before she died; But she look'd up, and with her soft blue eyes She saw him, clad already in the glow Of such a state of Being as to her Was new and most transcendent, but to him Familiar now ; and thus he welcomed her, His lifelong wife, to that still fairer home.
We too, perchance, shall join her at the last; If we are like her, or in any wise Can compass such a journey, such an end.
Meanwhile, she still is with us; and abides, A charming Presence, in the faithful hearts Of many folk, and most of all in mine. A. J. M.
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