Contents -Volume INDEX -AUTHOR INDEX -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889

The Widowed Heart

By Albert Pike (1809–1891)

THOU art lost to me forever!—I have lost thee, Isadore!

Thy head will never rest upon my loyal bosom more;

Thy tender eyes will never more look fondly into mine,

Nor thine arms around me lovingly and trustingly entwine,—

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

Thou art dead and gone, dear loving wife, thy heart is still and cold,

And mine, benumbed with wretchedness, is prematurely old:

Of our whole world of love and joy thou wast the only light,

A star, whose setting left behind, ah me! how dark a night!—

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

The vines and flowers we planted, Love, I tend with anxious care,

And yet they droop and fade away, as though they wanted air:

They cannot live without thine eyes to feed them with their light;

Since thy hands ceased to train them, Love, they cannot grow aright;—

Thou art lost to them forever, Isadore!

Our little ones inquire of me, where is their mother gone,—

What answer can I make to them, except with tears alone?

For if I say “To Heaven,” then the poor things wish to learn

How far it is, and where, and when their mother will return;—

Thou art lost to them forever, Isadore!

Our happy home has now become a lonely, silent place;

Like Heaven without its stars it is, without thy blessed face:

Our little ones are still and sad;—none love them now but I,

Except their mother’s spirit, which I feel is always nigh;—

Thou lovest us in Heaven, Isadore!

Their merry laugh is heard no more, they neither run nor play,

But wander round like little ghosts, the long, long Summer-day:

The spider weaves his web across the windows at his will,

The flowers I gathered for thee last are on the mantel still;—

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

Restless I pace our lonely rooms, I play our songs no more,

The garish Sun shines flauntingly upon the unswept floor;

The mocking-bird still sits and sings, O melancholy strain!

For my heart is like an Autumn cloud that overflows with rain;

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

Alas! how changed is all, dear wife, from that sweet eve in Spring,

When first my love for thee was told, and thou to me didst cling,

Thy sweet eyes radiant through their tears, pressing thy lips to mine,

In our old arbor, Dear, beneath the over-arching vine;—

Those lips are cold forever, Isadore!

The moonlight struggled through the leaves, and fell upon thy face,

So lovingly upturning there, with pure and trustful gaze;

The Southern breezes murmured through the dark cloud of thy hair,

As like a happy child thou didst in my arms nestle there;—

Death holds thee now forever, Isadore!

Thy love and faith so plighted then, with mingled smile and tear,

Was never broken, Darling, while we dwelt together here:

Nor bitter word, nor dark, cold look thou ever gavest me—

Loving and trusting always, as I loved and worshipped thee;—

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

Thou wast my nurse in sickness, and my comforter in health,

So gentle and so constant, when our love was all our wealth:

Thy voice of music cheered me, Love, in each despondent hour,

As Heaven’s sweet honey-dew consoles the bruised and broken flower;—

Thou art lost to me forever, Isadore!

Thou art gone from me forever;—I have lost thee, Isadore!

And desolate and lonely I shall be forever more:

Our children hold me, Darling, or I to God should pray

To let me cast the burthen of this long, dark life away,

And see thy face in Heaven, Isadore!

1844.