TO MY OWN PORTRAIT.
By Mrs. Hemans.
How is it that before mine eyes,
While gazing on thy mien,
All my past years of life arise,
As in a mirror seen?
What spell within thee hath been shrined,
To image back my own deep mind?
Even as a song of other times
Can trouble memory's springs;
Even as a sound of vesper-chimes
Can wake departed things;
Even as a scent of vernal flowers
Hath records fraught with vanished hours;
Such power is thine!—they come, the dead,
From the grave's bondage free,
And smiling back the changed are led,
To look in love on thee;
And voices that are music flown
Speak to me in the heart's full tone.
Till crowding thoughts my soul oppress,
The thoughts of happier years,
And a vain gush of tenderness
O'erflows in childlike tears;
