'Tis not that the flowers of twenty springs Which have wither'd as they rose Lie dead on my heart-strings With the weight of an age of snows. Not that the grass--O! may it thrive! On my grave is growing or grown-- But that, while I am dead yet alive I cannot be, lady, alone. _THE CONQUEROR WORM_ Lo! 'tis a gala night Within the lonesome latter years! An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drowned in tears, Sit in a theatre, to see A play of hopes and fears, While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres. Mimes, in the form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low, And hither and thither fly-- Mere puppets they, who come and go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Woe! That motley drama--oh, be sure It shall not be forgot! With its Phantom chased for evermore, By a crowd that seize it not, Through a circle that ever returneth in To the self-same spot, And much of Madness, and more of Sin, And Horror the soul of the plot. But see, amid the mimic rout A crawling shape intrude! A blood-red thing that writhes from out The scenic solitude! It writhes!--it writhes!--with mortal pangs The mimes become its food, And seraphs sob at vermin fangs In human gore imbued. Out--out are the lights--out all! And, over each quivering form, The curtain, a funeral pall, Comes down with the rush of a storm While the angels, all pallid and wan, Uprising, unveiling, affirm That the play is the tragedy, "Man," And its hero the Conqueror Worm. [Illustration: The Conqueror Worm] _SONNET--TO ZANTE_ Fair isle, that from the fairest of all flowers, Thy gentlest of all gentle names dost take! How many memories of what radiant hours At sight of thee and thine at once awake! How many scenes of what departed bliss! How many thoughts of what entombed hopes! How many visions of a maiden that is No more--no more upon thy verdant slopes! _No more!_ alas, that magical sad sound Transforming all! Thy charms shall please _no more_-- Thy memory _no more!_ Accursèd ground Henceforth I hold thy flower-enamelled shore, O hyacinthine isle! O purple Zante! "Isola d'oro! Fior di Levante!" _TO M. L. S.----_ [Mrs. Marie Louise Shew.]