Part 7 — SARA COLERIDGE

SLEEP, my babe, hear not the rippling wave, Nor feel the breeze that round thee ling’ring strays To drink thy balmy breath, And sigh one long farewell. Soon shall it mourn above thy wat’ry bed, And whisper to me, on the wave-beat shore, Deep murm’ring in reproach, Thy sad untimely fate. Ere those dear eyes had open’d on the light, In vain to plead, thy coming life was sold, O waken’d but to sleep, Whence it can wake no more! A thousand and a thousand silken leaves The tufted beech unfolds in early spring, All clad in tenderest green, All of the self-same shape: A thousand infant faces, soft and sweet, Each year sends forth, yet every mother views Her last not least beloved Like its dear self alone. No musing mind hath ever yet foreshaped The face to-morrow’s sun shall first reveal, No heart hath e’er conceived What love that face will bring. O sleep, my babe, nor heed how mourns the gale To part with thy soft locks and fragrant breath, As when it deeply sighs O’er autumn’s latest bloom.

SEE yon blithe child that dances in our sight! Can gloomy shadows fall from one so bright? Fond mother, whence these fears? While buoyantly he rushes o’er the lawn, Dream not of clouds to stain his manhood’s dawn, Nor dim that sight with tears. No cloud he spies in brightly glowing hours, But feels as if the newly vested bowers For him could never fade: Too well we know that vernal pleasures fleet, But having him, so gladsome, fair, and sweet, Our loss is overpaid. Amid the balmiest flowers that earth can give Some bitter drops distil, and all that live A mingled portion share; But, while he learns these truths which we lament, Such fortitude as ours will sure be sent, Such solace to his care.