Page:Poems Sigourney, 1834.pdf/104

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"The eye spoke after the tongue became motionless. Looking on his wife, and glancing over the others who surrounded his bed, it rested on his eldest son. with an expression, which was interpreted by all present to say, as plainly as if he had uttered the words of the beloved disciple— 'Behold thy mother.'" Memoir of the Reverend Edward Payson.

said the eye? The marble lip spake not, Save in that quivering sob with which stern Death Doth crush life's harp-strings. Lo! again it pours A tide of more than uttered eloquence,— "Son! look upon thy mother," and retires Beneath the curtain of the drooping lids To hide itself for ever. 'Tis the last— Last glance!—and ah! how tenderly it fell Upon that loved companion and the groups Who wept around. Full well the dying knew The value of those holy charities Which purge the dross of selfishness away; And deep he felt that woman's trusting heart, Rent from the cherished prop which, next to Christ, Had been her stay in all adversities, Would take the balm-cup best from that dear hand Which woke the sources of maternal love; That smile whose winning paid for sleepless nights Of cradle-care, that voice whose murmured tones Her own had moulded to the words of prayer.