Page:Sarah Sheppard - L. E. L.pdf/46

 Hence springs up likewise the felicitous Imagery which adorns her poems. Original and varied, this imagery is always in correct taste. Here again is difficulty in selection; but we will venture to pick up a few gems while hastily passing over this rich mine of poetic thought and feeling. Like precious stones, to judges, they will attest their own value:—

The stormy sky with its clouds,— Like a death-black ocean, where billows lie Dreaming dark dreams of storm in their sleep, When the wings of the tempest shall over them sweep."

"He wished his lot Had been cast in that humbler life Over whose peace the hour of strife Passes, but, like the storm at sea, That wakes not earth's tranquillity."

Flowers, like hopes, that spring and fade, As only for a mockery made; And shadows of the boughs that fall Like sorrow drooping over all."

"There spread                                              A wide heath covered with thick furze, whose flowers So bright, are like the pleasures of the world, Beautiful in the distance; but once gained, Little worth, piercing thro' the thorns which grow Around them ever." I can pass days Stretched in the shade of those old cedar trees, Watching the sunshine like a blessing fall, The breeze, like music, wandering o'er the boughs; Each tree a natural harp, each different leaf A different note, blent in one vast thanksgiving."

Referring to a sun-dial in the garden of her childhood's home:—

Ah! was it omen of life's after-time That even then the hours were told in shade?"