CASTLES IN THE AIR
I build my castles in the air.
How beautiful they seem to me,
Standing in all their glory there,
Like stars above the sea!
I watch them with admiring eyes,
For in them dwells life’s fondest hope:
If they be swept from out the skies,
In darkness I must grope.
They hold life’s joys, life’s sweetest dreams;
They make the weary years seem bright.
As one guided by bright starbeams
I struggle through the night.
Sometimes from out the skies they fall,
And my soul shrieks in its pain;
But from the heights I hear Hope’s call,
“Arise and build again.”
What though life be with sorrow filled
And each day brings its load of care,
I’m happy still while I can build
My castles in the air!
Who but will say, despite the metrical defects, this is a real poem? Another poem will show his art at a better advantage, while the pathos is of another kind, very touching pathos it is, too;
A SONG
I loved you, Dear. I did not know how much,
Until the silence of the Grave lay cold
Between us, and your hand I could not touch,
And your sweet face, oh! never more behold.
