C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Song: The moon shines bright aloft
By Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger (17791850)
T
O’er wood and dingle,
The birds in cadence soft
Their warblings mingle;
The breezes from the hill
Come sighing, sighing,
And to their voice the rill
Sends sweet replying.
Droops wan and sickly;
Death at its heart is cold—
’Twill perish quickly.
But yonder, chaplets twine
Forever vernal,
And in God’s presence shine
Through springs eternal.
Soon, softly creeping,
Shall paint my paler face
In death-trance sleeping.
Smile then on Death, that he
May gently take me,
And where no sorrows be,
Ere morn awake me!
Come, sweetly stealing,
Angel of death, and shower
Soft dews of healing!
Oh, come! Beneath thy blight
My soul shall quail not!
Yonder is endless light,
And joys that fail not!