Where are those lordly peaks that once defied The fury of the gales, nor deigned to bow To heaven’s own lightning? How the scornful tide Washes about and putters with them now; Yes, even my weak fingers have the power To fashion as I will or idly thrust Into a glass to mark the fleeting hour, These grains of sand - some crumbled mountain’s dust THE FUNERAL WREATH There is a cottage trim and neat, Who dwelt within I cannot say, It seemed so homey a retreat, My steps have often led that way. But now a wreath is hung before Its silent door. A funeral wreath of sombre tone Where Death has shed a ray of gloom; And someone mourns for someone gone Within a vacant darkened room. So eloquent of human grief Is every leaf! Such is the laurel crown that waits Our journey’s end through toil and tears; The emblem grim that decorates Your door and mine, e’er many years So that some idle passer by May wonder why! MEMORY She crouches in the caves of thought Enchantress, brooding o’er the fire, And those her mystic charms have sought Shall sometime gain their heart’s desire. With mumblings and averted gaze She weaves her spells, while to and fro Like shadows from the mounting blaze, Upon the walls there come and go The scenes of far off happier days Faint visions of the long ago. The eastern tyrant steals in dead of night Down rock hewn stairs and through an iron door; And feasts his eyes by flaring torch’s light Upon the wealth heaped on his treasury floor; On bursting sacks of coin, caskets of gems Scepters of ruby, diamond diadems, A kingdom’s plunder. We, like him, have stored Our hidden wealth, and memory keeps the key, No jewels lustreless, are in our hoard But trophies of a richer dynasty, The sweet experiences that time endears Sifted and winnowed gleanings of the years. With halting steps and labored breath we climb The attic stairs and rummage sadly through The toys and trifling things our childhood knew, Until our brooding thoughts are lost to time, And like the dust motes dancing in the beams Come thronging memories through a mist of dreams. Forth from an aged tome there falls a flower Faded and crumbling, yet its petals glow, Once more in the sweet memory of that hour When loving fingers gave it long ago. As through the spectral city of the dead With downcast eyes and reverential tread We note the broken columns and the urns In marble draped, and e’er our gaze returns To our own name graved on the granite bare The death date blank - yet it will soon be there!