MY father! in the vague, mysterious past, My boyish thoughts have wandered o'er and o'er, To thy lone grave upon a distant shore, The wanderer of the waters, still at last. Never in childhood have I blithely sprung To catch my father's voice, or climb his knee; He was a constant pilgrim of the sea, And died upon it when his boy was young. He perished not in conflict nor in flame, No laurel garland rests upon his tomb; Yet in stern duty's path he met his doom; A life heroic, though unwed to fame! First in vague depths of fancy, scarce-defined, Love limned his wavering likeness on my soul, Till through slow growths it waxed a perfect whole Of clear conceptions, brightening heart and mind. His careless bearing and his manly face, His cordial eye; his firm-knit, stalwart form, Fitted to breast the fight, the wreck, the storm; The sailor's frankness and the soldier's grace. In dreams, in dreams we've mingled, and a swell Of feeling mightier for the eyes' eclipse, The music of a blest Apocalypse, Thrilled through my spirit with its mystic spell: Ah, then! ofttimes a sadder scene will rise, A gallant vessel through the mistbound day, Lifting her spectral spars above the bay, Gloomily swayed against gray glimmering skies. O'er the dim billows thundering, peals a boom Of the deep gun that bursteth as a knell, When the brave tender to the brave farewell -- And strong arms bear a comrade to the tomb. . . . . . The opened sod: a sorrowing band beside -- One rattling roll of musketry, and then, A man no more among his fellow-men, Darkness his chamber, and the earth his bride, My father sleeps in peace; perchance more blest Than some he left to mourn him, and to know The bitter blight of an enduring woe, Longing (how oft!) with him to be at rest. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BEARS AT RASPBERRY TIME by HAYDEN CARRUTH ON A PICTURE OF LEANDER by JOHN KEATS WITCH-WIFE by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY THE MAIDS OF ELFIN-MERE by WILLIAM ALLINGHAM OUR HERITAGE by ISIDORE G. ASCHER LESBIA'S COMPLAINT AGAINST THYRISIS HIS INCONSTANCY; A SONNET by PHILIP AYRES SONNET FROM JAPAN: 1. THE SPELL by ADELAIDE NICHOLS BAKER |