Page:Poems Sigourney 1827.pdf/42

42

For lingering o'er the pallid face Was that expression mild, With which a youthful mother's grace Doth lull her grieving child.

Those parted lips the babe beloved Had sooth'd with freezing breath, And that cold arm's fond curve had proved His pillow even in death.

Yet still the fatal blasts would rove Wild through her clustering hair, Those blasts which to a seraph's love Had changed a mother's care.

And oh! it was a fearful sight, As on with measured tread, O'er many a dark and slippery height, They bare the beauteous dead.

The infant clasp'd in monkish arms Sprang from his broken rest, And eager hid his cherub charms Deep in her marble breast.

"Boy,—boy,—'tis vain!"—yet fast the tears O'er furrow'd features ran, To see how twine with infant years The miseries of man.

When thrice the morn with sceptre fair The angry clouds had quell'd, With mass and dirge and murmur'd prayer The funeral rites they held.