Classic Poem

'T IS said she once was beautiful; — and still —
(For 'tis not years that can have wrought her ill,) —
Deep rays of loveliness around her form
Beam, as the rainbow that succeeds the storm,
Brightens a glorious ruin. In her face,
Though something touched by sorrow, you may trace
The all she was, when first in life's young spring,
Like the gay bee-bird on delighted wing,
She stooped to cull the honey from each flower
That bares its breast in joy's luxuriant bower!
O'er her pure forehead, pale as moonlit snow,
Her ebon locks are parted, — and her brow
Stands forth like morning from the shades of night,
Serene, though clouds hang over it. The bright
And searching glance of her Ithuriel eye,
Might even the sternest hypocrite defy
To meet it unappalled; — 'twould almost seem
As though, epitomized in one deep beam,
Her full collected soul upon the heart,
Whate'er its mask, she strove at once to dart:
And few may brave the talisman that 's hid
'Neath the dark fringes of her drooping lid.

Patient in suffering, she has learned the art
To bleed in silence and conceal the smart;
And thence, though quick of feeling, hath been deemed
Almost as cold and loveless as she seemed;
Because to fools she never would reveal
Wounds they would probe — without the power to heal.
No, — whatsoe'er the visions that disturb
The fountain of her thoughts, she knows to curb
Each outward sign of sorrow, and suppress —
Even to a sigh — all tokens of distress.
Yet some, perhaps, with keener vision than
The crowd, that pass her by unnoted, can,
Through well-dissembled smiles, at times, discern
A settled anguish that would seem to burn
The very brain it feeds upon; and when
This mood of pain is on her, then, oh! then
A more than wonted paleness of the cheek, —
And, it may be, a flitting hectic streak, —
A tremulous motion of the lip or eye, —
Are all that anxious friendship may descry.

Reserve and womanly pride are in her look,
Though tempered into meekness. She can brook
Unkindness and neglect from those she loves,
Because she feels it undeserved; which proves,
That firm and conscious rectitude hath power
To blunt Fate's darts in sorrow's darkest hour.
Ay, unprovoked, injustice she can bear
Without a sigh, — almost without a tear,
Save such as hearts internally will weep,
And they ne'er rise the burning lids to steep;
But to those petty wrongs which half defy
Human forbearance, she can make reply
With a proud lip, and a contemptuous eye.

There is a speaking sadness in her air,
A hue of languor o'er her features fair,
Born of no common grief; as though Despair
Had wrestled with her spirit — been o'erthrown, —
And these the trophies of the strife alone.
A resignation of the will, a calm
Derived from pure religion (that sweet balm
For wounded breasts) is seated on her brow,
And ever to the tempest bends she now,
Even as a drooping lily, which the wind
Sways as it lists. The sweet affections bind
Her sympathies to earth; her peaceful soul
Has long aspired to that immortal goal,
Where pain and anguish cease to be our lot,
And the world's cares and frailties are forgot!