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Hanna, Abigail Stanley

"Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland"


'Tis true, that friendship's hand is kind,
My aching brow and heart to bind;
Beside my bed a husband stands,
And anxious children press my hands;
A gentle mother acts her part,
And sisters, with each winning art;
Father and brothers waiting still,
The slightest mandate of my will;
Each anxious, who shall earliest prove,
The tender gushings of their love.
Sometimes there comes a vision fair,
Of waving groves, and balmy air,
Of placid skies, serene and mild,
As slumber stealing o'er a child;
Where breezes hushed to deep repose,
Sleep in the bosom of the rose,
And scarcely lift their fragile wing,
One dew-drop from the flower to fling;
But leave it for the sun's warm ray,
To kiss the pearly tear away.
Pleasant sounds the gushing rill,
That bubbles down the verdant hill,
Murmuring along ifs native glen,
Far from the fev'rish haunts of men,--
Till kissing soft its pebbly shore,
It dies, nor ever murmurs more.
And fairy forms around me dance,--
Now they retreat, and now advance;
Bright wreaths around their heads they wear,
And lutes in their fair hands they bear,
Each warbling forth, in cadence low,
Their pleasant number, as they go,
And music floats high in mid air,
As bands of angels hover'd there;
Four massive chains of purest gold,
A chrystal island seem to hold,
Gently waving it in air,
As angel spirits lingered there.
Like ocean, in a summer day,
When gentlest zephyrs with him play.


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