Classic Poem

Claire.

Who may the maiden be, tripping by —
Laughing her air, and her footstep light?
How in her smile, and her sparkling eye,
All that is graceful and good unite!
She's a young seamstress — the rest by her side
Mark how she blooms, and themselves despair:
Beauty like hers is a father's pride —
Yes, she's the grave-digger's daughter, Claire.

Claire has a home in the burial ground —
See you the sun on her window play?
Hark! hear you not a low murmuring sound?
'Tis from her dove-cot it comes this way.
Yonder what flutters about the tombs,
Dazzlingly white? what a lovely pair!
Whose are those doves with the snow-white plumes?
Pets of the grave-digger's daughter, Claire.

Passing at eve by her cottage wall,
Up to the roof with a vine o'erhung,
Snatches of song on your ear may fall —
Listen you must, 'tis so sweetly sung.
Ditty of love, or a carol gay —
Smiling or pensive you linger there:
" Who the enchantness? " you well may say —
She? 'tis the grave-digger's daughter, Claire.

Oft in yon thicket at dawn of day,
Under its lilacs, her laugh is ringing;
There where the flowers in a rich bouquet,
Still wet with dew, to her hand are springing
There, how superbly the myrtle is growing!
There, in the plants what a thriving air!
Roses are there ever freshly blowing —
All for the grave-digger's daughter, Claire.

But for the morrow gay scenes are planned —
Under her roof many guests rejoice;
Claire on a fiddler bestows her hand —
Handsome and young — he's her father's choice
How will her heart in the dance to-morrow
Throb 'neath the silk and the gauze she'll wear —
Children, and toil, but no touch of sorrow,
Heaven give the grave-digger's daughter, Claire!