“Hope of my hope, gone o’er the swelling ocean! I weep for thee when night is on the sea: My bosom bursteth with its deep emotion— My spirit stretcheth out its arms but finds not thee. O misery! and then itself within itself retires, And weeps away a night that has no morn; And lights forever up fierce funeral pyres— Dreaming of cypress wreaths, and things forlorn. “What sea-nymph made thy bed Beneath the briny waves? Thetis with golden hair? Panopea wondrous fair, Lone virgin of the ocean’s deepest caves, With filmy garments shred About thy form, Mock of the brumal storm? Ho! mourn with me, ye nymphs, he is no more! Go sound it, Triton, o’er the humid waters! Go weep for him again, ye misty daughters! Re-echo it, ye cliffs, along our shore! And I myself will take the sad refrain Of the elegiac strain, And tune my lyre to a symphonious stream Floating along with many a moony gleam, Soft as an angel’s dream, Over the foamy summit of each wave, That rolleth o’er his grave. “Well do I know the day That bore him hence away! I watched him from yon cliff, in joy departing: I, with the tear-drops starting, Wept that he thus should go. He, hopeful of the future, saw not wo In the dim cloud that gathered, and the spray Leaped joyful up about his seaward way— Leaped up the vessel’s sides with treacherous kiss; Deceitful waves, that now in the abyss Have whelmed my love’s proud form, Play of the pitiless storm. “I’ve wept until my tears Have worn with furrows deep my pallid cheek; Have gazed until my poor eyes, worn and weak, Like age’s eyes, seem faded with long years. Oh! the long, dreary nights I’ve passed alone! Would Reason from her throne Might flee, and bear with her this dim, dull grief— This memory’s haunting tone! Then might I have relief. Receive me, ocean! lo, to thee I come! I, too, will share thy home: Our bridal bed shall be of pearls and diamonds, First loved, last loved, and fondly loved forever. No distance e’er shall sever—” The voice was hushed; I sped me to the strand. Only the moonlight fell; and o’er the sand A fountain gushed, pure as our holiest dreams. Perchance ’twas she, thus changed; how could I tell? And gone, as Arethusa once, beneath the deep, Had sought her lover in his quiet sleep. * * * * * THE YEARS OF LOVE.