Poems (Louisa Blake)/Earth and Heaven

EARTH AND HEAVEN.

It was in youth, and flowers sweet Their perfumes far and wide were flinging,As closely cluster'd round my feet In varied beauty they were springing;

I looked around, and beings bright Came o'er my 'raptured vision stealingLike angel forms of life and light Whose every glance spoke soul and feeling;

I look'd above, and far on high Countless worlds with me were sharingHis kind care who made the sky As on they roll'd his love declaring;

I look'd within,—my grateful heart Was full of joy and life and gladness,It thought not of afflictions dart, It never dream'd of aught like sadness.

Years pass'd—and lo! the flowers so fair Had all their fragrant petals shed,Their graceful stems were bent and bare, Their hues were faded—they were dead!

I look'd around—the forms so bright Unmindful of their heavenly birth,Had turn'd their souls from God's own light, Had bound and chain'd them down to earth.

I look'd within, and there decay Had touch'd the chain which bound me here,Till link by link had dropp'd away, And left my heart deserted, drear.

I raised once more my weeping eye, Ere it should close in sorrow's night,But no sad changes mark'd the sky, There all was lovely, all was bright:

And there my wearied eye shall rest, For to my heart is kindly givenIn those bright skies, a presage blest, Of changeless joy and peace in Heaven.