FLOWER, RAINBOW, BIRD, AND STAR. 55

So, like that lovely flower,

And like that rainbow's light,

And like the bird of the summer bower,

And the glittering star of night,

Hath thy loved one, in life's pure spring,
From thy fond embraces riven,

Been borne away on an angel's wing,
To dwell in the light of heaven.

CASA WAPPY.*

AND hast thou sought thy heavenly home,
Our fond, dear boy,-

The realms where sorrow dare not come,
Where life is joy?

1

Pure at thy death as at thy birth,

Thy spirit caught no taint from earth;

Even by its bliss we mete our death,
Casa Wappy!

Despair was in our last farewell,
As closed thine eye;

Tears of our anguish may not tell

When thou didst die

* Casa Wappy was the self-conferred pet name of an infant son of the poet, snatched away after a very brief illness.

Words may not paint our grief for thee, Sighs are but bubbles on the sea

Of our unfathomed agony,

Casa Wappy!

Thou wert a vision of delight

To bless us given ;

Beauty embodied to our sight,
A type of heaven :

So dear to us thou wert, thou art
Even less thine own self than a part
Of mine and of thy mother's heart,

Casa Wappy!

Thy bright, brief day knew no decline, 'T was cloudless joy;

Sunrise and night alone were thine,
Beloved boy!

This morn beheld thee blithe and gay,
That found thee prostrate in decay,

And e'er a third shone, clay was clay,

Casa Wappy!

Gem of our hearth, our household pride,

Earth's undefiled,

Could love have saved, thou hadst not died, Our dear, sweet child!

Humbly we bow to fate's decree;

Yet had we hoped that time should see
Thee mourn for us, not us for thee,
Casa Wappy!

Do what I may, go where I will,
Thou meet'st my sight;

There dost thou glide before me still, —
A form of light!

I feel thy breath upon my cheek,
I see thee smile, I hear thee speak,
Till, O! my heart is like to break,

Casa Wappy!

Methinks thou smil'st before me now,
With glance of stealth,

The hair thrown back from thy full brow
In buoyant health :

I see thine eyes' deep violet light,
Thy dimpled cheek carnationed bright,
Thy clasping arms so round and white,
Casa Wappy!

The nursery shows thy pictured wall, Thy bat, thy bow,

Thy cloak and bonnet, club and ball;
But where art thou?

A corner holds thine empty chair,
Thy playthings idly scattered there
But speak to us of our despair,

Casa Wappy!

Even to the last, thy every word -
To glad, to grieve –

Was sweet as sweetest song of bird
On summer's eve :

In outward beauty undecayed,

Death o'er thy spirit cast no shade,, And like the rainbow thou didst fade, Casa Wappy!