WATOUSKA.
Reading edition
A LEGEND OF THE ONEIDAS.
———
BY KATE ST. CLAIR.
———
Away, in a forest’s gloom,
Where the shadowy branches wave
O’er a rude and moss-grown tomb,
Is an Indian maiden’s grave:
None knoweth that music-haunted spot—
Save a far-off one, who forgets it not.
He dreams of that silent shore—
’Tis a holy spot to him,
A solemn stillness broodeth o’er
Those forest-aisles so dim;
Bird-music, and wave-melody,
Blend with the murmurings of the bee.
He knows when the wild-rose showers
Its blossoms o’er her breast;
When the summer-winds, ’mid flowers,
Whisper above her rest:
And he deems he hears, on his far-off shore,
The music of the cataract’s roar
From that Island of the Blest!
She passed from earth away—
The young, the beautiful,
In the long dreamy day
When golden shadows fell
O’er wave and vine, and moons had sped,
Yet there, while that brief season fled,
He’d kept Love’s vigil well.
He comes, that warrior-chief,
Once more, in the pale moon’s wane,
When the dews weep o’er each leaf,
To that haunted spot again—
But morn with its glorious beauty woke
Him not—the warrior’s heart had broke.