Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1846-01-29
POETRY.
From Hoods Magazine and Comic Miscellany
THE LADY'S DREAM.

THE LADY'S DREAM.
The LADY lay in her bed,
Her couch warm and soft,
But her sleep was restless ana broken sum
For turning often and OF
From side to side, she muttered and moanod
And tossed her arms nofl.
AT Ia ST she started up,
And rnzed on the vacant air,
With look OF awe, as if she saw
Some dreadful phantom there
And then in the pillow she buried her ace
From visions i'll to bear.
The very curtain shook,
Her terror was so extreme,
And the light that fell on the broidered quilt
Kept Il tremulous CLEAN:
And her voice hollow, and shook as she CRIED
"Oh nc that awful dream!
That weary, weary walk,
In the churchyurd's dismal ground
Aud those horrible things, with shady wings,
That came aud fitted round,-
Death DEATH and nothing but death,
In every sight and sound
And oh those maidcus young,
Who wrought in that dreary room,
With figures dropping and spectres thin,
And checks without blOomj
And the voice that cried, For The pomp Of pride
We haste to an early tomb!
{" For the pomp and pleasure of pride,
We toll like Alric slaves,
And only to earn u home at last
Where wonder cypress wavc-"
And then he poinCd--I never saw
A giound so full Of graves
And still the collins came,
With sorrowiul trains and slows
Coffin after coffin still,
A sad and sickening show;
From gricf exempt, never had dreampt
OF such World Of Wo
" OF the hearts that daily break,
Of the tears that hourly fall,
OF the many, many troubles of life,
That grieve this earthly ball
Disease and Hunger, Pain and WANT
But now dreampt of them all
" For the blind and the cripple were there,
And the babe that pinned for brend,
And the houseless man, and the widow poor
Who begged-to bury the dead
The naked, alas, that might have clad,
The famished l might have fed
" The sorrow l might have soothed,
And the unregurded tears
For many throngng shape was there,
From long. forgotten years;
Az, even the poor rejected Moor,
Who raised my childish fears!
Each pleading look, that long ago
/ scanned with needless eye;
Each face gazing as plainly there
As when passed 1t by;
Wo, for me, if the past should he
Thus present when die !
No need of sulphurious lake,
No need of fiery coal,
But only that crowd of human kind
Who wanted pity and dole
In everlasting retrospect
viii wiring my sinful soul!
Alas have walked through life
Too needless where trod:
Nay, helping to trample my fellow-worm,
And fill the burial sod
Forgetting that even the sparrow falls
Not unmarked Of God
(" drank the richest draughts
And ate whatever is good
Fish, and flesh, and fowl, and fruit,
Supplied my hungry mood;
But never remembered the wretched ones
hat starye for want of food
dressed as the noble dress,
In cloth Of silver and gold,
With silk, and satin, and costly furs,
In many ample fold;
But never remembered the naked limbs
That ffoze with winters cold.
" The wounds might have healed
The human sorrow and smart
And vet it was never in my soul
To play so i'll part;
But evil is wrought by want Of Thought,
As well a. want of Heart ~
She casped her iervent hands,
And the tears began TO stream;
Large, and bitter, and fast they fell,
Remotse was so extreme
And yet, oh yet, that many dame
Would dream the Lady's Dream!