A day of Freedom is each dawning day,
And day of Grace to sinful erring men;
While shines its sun they all may find their way
Back to the path of virtue truth again.
Its beauty all may love, its light all see,
Its noon-day glory fills the heaven and earth;
From night's dark bondage it the soul would free,
And make it heir of an immortal birth.
In it the Psalmist saw God's law made clear,
The law of freedom, purity, and right;
But Christ taught unto God all men were dear,
And called to be the children of the light;

My life as yet is but an infant's walk,
With tottering steps and words half-uttered slow;
But I shall soon in nobler accents talk,
And grown to manlier stature, firmer go;
I shall go out and in and pasture find
In him who leads me safe forever on;
The spirit's fetters then shall I unbind,
And sin from me forever shall be gone;
Eternal life will be the gift bestowed,
By him who loved us while yet dead in sin;
Such love forever from the Father flowed,
But we were not prepared the crown to win;
Oh bless his name, who calls us on to heaven;

With laughter swimming in thine eye,
That told youth's heartfelt revelry;
And motion changeful as the wing
Of swallow waken'd by the spring;
With accents blythe as voice of May
Chaunting glad Nature's roundelay;
Circled by joy like planet bright
That smiles 'mid wreathes of dewy light,—
Thy image such, in former time,
When thou, just entering on thy prime,
And woman's sense in thee combined
Gently with childhood's simplest mind,
First taught'st my sighing soul to move
With hope towards the heaven of love!

Now years have given my Mary's face

Beautiful mortals of the glowing earth
And children of the season crowd together
In showers and sunny weather
Ye beautiful spring hours
Sunshine and all together
I love wild flowers

The rain drops lodge on the swallows wing
Then fall on the meadow flowers
Cowslips and enemonies all come with spring
Beaded with first showers
The skylarks in the cowslips sing
I love wild flowers

Blue-bells and cuckoo's in the wood
And pasture cuckoo's too
Red yellow white and blue
Growing where herd cows meet the showers
And lick the morning dew

Love was true to me,
True and tender;
I who ought to be
Love's defender
Let the cold winds blow
Till they chilled him;
Let the winds and snow
Shroud him—and I know
That I killed him.

Years he cried to me
To be kinder;
I was blind to see
And grew blinder.
Years with soft hands raised
Fondly reaching,
Wept and prayed and praised,
Still beseeching.

When he died I woke,
God! how lonely,
When the grey dawn broke
On one only.
Now beside Love's grave
I am kneeling;
All he sought and gave

He had a falcon on his wrist,
A hound beside his knee,
A jewelled rapier at his thigh;
Quoth he: “Which may she be?
My chieftain cried: ‘Bear forth, my page,
This ring to Lady Clare;
Thou'lt know her by her sunny eyes
And golden lengths of hair.’
But here are lovely damsels three,
In glittering coif and veil,
And all have sunny locks and eyes,—
To which unfold the tale?”

Out spake the first: “O pretty page,
Thou hast a wealthy lord;
I love to see the jewels rare
Which deck thy slender sword!”

He stood beside her in the dawn—
And she his Dawn and she his Spring.
From her bright palm she fed her fawn,
Her swift eyes chased the swallow's wing;
Her restless lips, smile-haunted, cast
Shrill silver calls to hound and dove;
Her young locks wove them with the blast.
To the flushed azure shrine above
The light boughs o'er her golden head
Tossed emerald arm and blossom palm;
The perfume of their prayer was spread
On the sweet wind in breath of balm.

“Dawn of my heart,” he said, “O child,
Knit thy pure eyes a space with mine:

How moving, man and woman singing in one body!
She only hopes for divine aid, her heart out on the waves.
In the crazed anguish of the autumn wind, love's grass lies exposed;
ten thousand leagues of misty waves, the depth of her tears' traces.

I hear that the peonies are magnificent
in the famous gardens now
and that rich families will be enjoying them
until spring is almost gone.
What a shame! I too am a man who loves to look at flowers
but I am much too busy, watering my vegetable patch!

Love comes back to his vacant dwelling,—
—The old, old Love that we knew of yore!
—We see him stand by the open door,
With his great eyes sad, and his bosom swelling.

He makes as though in our arms repelling,
—He fain would lie as he lay before;—
Love comes back to his vacant dwelling,—
—The old, old Love that we knew of yore!

Ah, who shall keep us from over-spelling
—That sweet forgotten, forbidden lore!
—E'ndash as we doubt in our hearts once more,
With a rush of tears to our eyelids welling,
Love comes back to his vacant dwelling.