Classic Poem

WITH A COLLECTION OF VERSES .

A PASSING sigh, perhaps — perchance a sneer —
Is all these lines, if ever read, may claim;
And the wild thoughts, so vainly written here,
A worldly mind, perhaps, will calmly name
The sickly record of " a stripling's flame. "

Yet, Lady, should you chance when years are fled,
Some hour when Memory from each burial-place
Gives up once more her long-forgotten dead,
Recalls the looks of each familiar face,
And in the heart renews each time-worn trace —

At such an hour, when others claim the sigh
Remembrance gives to early ties decay'd,
To hopes and fears now gone for ever by,
To scenes in memory's twilight charms array'd,
And loves and friendships long ago betray'd —

Should you then chance these faded lines to meet,
I know they will thy transient gaze arrest;
And he whose heart while yet Hope's pulses beat
Was thine, within thy pensive breast
Will claim one gentle thought among the rest.