Page:Poems Baldwin.djvu/94

Now sounds of joy from happy groups arise,
And torches light the gloomy low'ring skies.
Oh, fair the bride the flowing veil conceals,
And bright the joy the bridegroom's eye reveals.
The torches fall! the music swift is still'd;
With cries of grief the mourning air is fill'd.
Loud on the midnight air they sweep along,
And every echo wakes them, deep and strong.
Far o'er the land the clouds of sorrow fall,
And friend to friend all sadly, vainly call.
How can they leave their own then dying one?
All, all have lost their own, their first-born son!

The steed that bore the warrior o'er the plain
Stands at his watching mother's door again;
But he who rode away to-day in pride
Far in the lonely desert fell and died!
The ruler bends his stately form in grief;
Deep groans can give his spirit no relief,—
The loveliest maid in all wide Egypt lies
A cold, cold corpse before her father's eyes!
The mother claps her infant in her rest,
While tender fear is trembling in her breast;
She wakes,—she finds the lovely one is there,
Smiles at her dream, and breathes a whisper'd pray'r;
But lo! how cold that little form and still:—
The mother's cries the lonely dwelling fill!