Poems (Ford)/Come Back Again
COME BACK AGAIN.
Sad words are breathed in this world of ours,That cloud its sunshine and blight its flowers,—Words of deep anguish and wild farewell,That strike the heart like a funeral knell;But, oh, most mournful of all the wordsThat wring a wail from the heart-harp's chordsIs that low murmur breathed forth in vainFor some lost treasure: Come back again!
The youth alone on the path of life,Braving its danger and toil and strife,Though fame and fortune may wait his call,Still feels a shade o'er his spirit fall;To vanished scenes oft his thoughts will roam,—The dear old nooks round his childhood's home,The friends he loved, haunt his heart and brain,And bid him cry: Oh, come back again!
The flattered beauty whose lightest wordBy fawning minions with smiles is heard,Knows well those smiles veil cold hearts below,Like wintry sunbeams on mounts of snow, And, sighing, turns to her early youth,When all the world wore the light of truth;And, as her tears fall like autumn rain,Cries: Happy childhood, come back again!
Stern manhood, too, when life's noon is past,A lingering look oft will backward castTo his glad boyhood, its hopes and fears,To his young manhood's more clouded years,To those he loved ere his heart grew cold,'And left true friends for the sake of gold;Wealth brings not joy, and he cries in vain:Friends of my youth, oh, come back again!
See, robed in splendor, the stately dameWho gave her hand for a noble name;She pines surrounded by pomp and glare;Her heart is not, and can ne'er be there,—A vanished form through her dreams will glide,A heart she crushed in her cruel pride,And sorrow wrings forth that cry of pain:Oh, glad, free girlhood, come back again!
The wretch whose heart is bowed down by crime,Whose locks are whitened before their time,E'en he can think of a long-ago,When his young soul was as mountain snow,—And memory pictures the old roof-treeWhere oft he bent at his mother's knee; He cries: Alas! were her prayers in vain;Pure heart of childhood, come back again!
Oh, far more lovely in childhood's hours'Are the green fields and sweet wildwood flowers,Than all the glory that meets our gazeOr gilds our pathway in after days.The guileless vision to childhood givenTints all it sees with the hues of heaven,And when they vanish, that cry of painBursts from the soul: Oh, come back again!
The human heart is a restless thing,Forever roaming on Fancy's wing,Or turning back to the days gone by,That memory holds to its longing eye;And, let the present be e'er so bright,The past is veiled in a misty lightThat makes it brighter, and still in vainThe heart must cry: Oh, come back again!