STANZAS WRITTEN IN INDISPOSITION.

I. The Spring is fair, when early flowers Unfold them to the golden sun; When, singing to the gladsome hours, Blue streams through vernal meadows run; When from the woods and from the sky The birds their joyous anthems pour; And Ocean, filled with melody, Sends his glad billows to the shore. II. The Spring is sweet: its balmy breath Is rapture to the wearied breast, When vines with roses fondly wreathe, Fann’d by soft breezes from the West; When, opening by the cottage eave, The earliest buds invite the bee; And brooks their icy bondage leave, To dance in music toward the sea. III. The Spring is gay: but to my heart The glorious hues she used to wear, As sunset clouds in gloom depart, Have vanish’d in the empty air: They move not now my spirit’s wing, As in the stainless days of yore: The happy dreams they used to bring Have pass’d—and they will come no more. IV. Not that those dreams have lost their sway— Not that my heart hath lost its chords; Still with affection tuned, they play, And leap at friendship’s kindly words; But ’tis that to my languid eye A newness from life’s scene hath flown, Which once upon the open sky, And o’er the teeming earth, was thrown. V. Yes! there IS something, which no more In Nature’s gorgeous round I find; Something that charm’d in days of yore, And filled with Sabbath peace my mind; Which added lustre to the flower, And verdure to the field and tree, And wings to every sunny hour, While roseate health remained with me! VI. But Time’s stern wave hath roll’d along, And now on Manhood’s waste I stand, And mourn young Fancy’s faded throng Of radiant hopes and visions bland; Yet, kindling o’er my onward way, The light of love divine I see, And hear a voice which seems to say: ‘Pilgrim! in Heaven there’s rest for thee!’