Felicia Dorothea Hemans, ‘To a Departed Spirit’ (1829)
From the bright stars, or from the viewless air,
Or from some world unreached by human thought,
Spirit, sweet spirit! if thy home be there,
And if thy visions with the past be fraught,
Answer me, answer me!
Have we not communed here of life and death?
Have we not said that love, such love as ours,
Was not to perish as a rose’s breath,
To melt away, like song from festal bowers?
Answer me, answer me!
Thine eye’s last light was mine – the soul that shone
Intensely, mournfully, through gathering haze –
Didst thou bear with thee to the shore unknown,
Nought of what lived in that long, earnest gaze!
Hear, hear, and answer me!
Thy voice – its low, soft, fervent, farewell tone
Thrilled through the tempest of the parting strife,
Like a faint breeze: – oh, from that music flown,
Send back
one
sound, if love’s be quenchless life,
But once, oh! answer me!
In the still noontide, in the sunset’s hush,
In the dead hour of night, when thought grows deep,
When the heart’s phantoms from the darkness rush,
Fearfully beautiful, to strive with sleep –
Spirit! then answer me!
By the remembrance of our blended prayer;
By all our tears, whose mingling made them sweet
By our last hope, the victor o’er despair; –
Speak! if our souls in deathless yearnings meet;
Answer me, answer me!
The grave is silent: – and the far-off sky,
And the deep midnight – silent all, and lone!
Oh! if thy buried love make no reply,
What voice has earth! – Hear, pity, speak, mine own!
Answer me, answer me!
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Categories: Literature