260
by the fireside.
Dear for your sake the fireside where we sit
Watching these sad, bright pictures come and go;
That waning years are with your memory lit,
Is now the lonely comfort that we know.
Watching these sad, bright pictures come and go;
That waning years are with your memory lit,
Is now the lonely comfort that we know.
Is it all memory? Lo, these forest-boughs
Burst on the hearth into fresh leaf and bloom;
Waft a vague, far-off sweetness through the house,
And give close walls the hillside's breathing-room.
Burst on the hearth into fresh leaf and bloom;
Waft a vague, far-off sweetness through the house,
And give close walls the hillside's breathing-room.
A second life, more spiritual than the first,
They find, a life won only out of death.—
O sainted souls, within you still is nursed
For us a flame not fed by mortal breath.
They find, a life won only out of death.—
O sainted souls, within you still is nursed
For us a flame not fed by mortal breath.
Unseen, you bring to this, erewhile your home,
Fresh air from the new country close above;
Through no oblivious heaven your footsteps roam;
Alive in God, you bless us with His love.
Fresh air from the new country close above;
Through no oblivious heaven your footsteps roam;
Alive in God, you bless us with His love.
