Classic Poem

I AM athirst for love!
And eyes are near,
Like fountains clear,
Where I might drink my fill:
But Duty binds me in a stern caress,
Seals up those founts of blessedness,
And fetters down my will.
And home-born memories,
And home-loved faces, from my heart arise
In venerable might,
Hang, like a veil, before those beaming eyes,
And hide them from my sight!

I am athirst for love!
And lips are nigh,
Whose dewy smile allures the eye;
Whose pressure soft unlocks, with curious art,
The secret wards and labyrinths of the heart.
Their gently murmuring words, to me how dear,
I may not hear!
Like some lorn pilgrim from a distant land,
Before the longed-for oracle I stand;
At distance gaze in silence there,
And may no nearer move;
And see those lips yet motionless, nor dare
Unseal their silence with the watch-word " Love! "

My soul is athirst for love!
Near me I find
A polished mind,
Whose dark-orbed windows, 'neath their rounded brow,
Now flash with mirth, and now with feeling glow,
Reveal its strength and symmetry,
Wit, eloquence, and poesy,
And, dearest to a Christian's soul,
Religion's wings soft brooding o'er the whole: —
Yet dare not rove with it along
The flowery fields of song,
Nor strike the many-voiced strings
Of higher, holier things!
I listen: but I hear no " dying fall: "
Silent to me are all; —
Silent as those sad harps, that, quite unstrung.
By captive Judah's woes and fears,
On bending willows hung;
While the sweet songs of Zion were unsung.
And Babel's streams ran swollen with Israel's tears.

I am athirst for love!
Yet why, my Soul, this pensive strain?
She feels not for thy pain!
In old Arcadia's woodland green,
When " the bright goddess of the silver bow, "
Attired in sylvan sheen,
With merry triumph laughed,
And sped the feathered shaft:
Reck'd she how the stricken roe,
Dragged through the lengthening glades
And gloomy shades
His wounded life along, weary and slow?
Ah, no!

I am athirst for love!
And yet, for two long years,
Trembling with smothered hopes and fears,
Have stood beside a bright inviting stream
As if 'twere all — a dream!
Nor ever sank upon my knee, to dip
Into the wave my parched lip;
But, with a spell-bound eye,
Stood still, and watched that sparkling stream roll by.
And now I go
Far from the music of its placid flow;
And bid that yearning love I dare not tell,