The Star Of The North

Poetry.

THE SHADOW IN THE VALLEY

There's a mossy shady valley
Where the waters wind and flow,
And the daisies sleep in winter,
Neath a coverlet of snow;
And violets, blue-eye! violet,
Bloom in beauty in the spring,
And the sunbeams kiss the wavelets,
Till they seem to laugh and sing.

But in autumn when the sunlight
Crowns the cedar covered hill,
Shadows darken in the valley,
Shadows ominous and still:
And the yellow leaves like banners,
Of an elfin host that's fled,
Tinged with gold and royal purple,
Fluttered sadly overhead.

And those shadows, gloomy shadows
Like dim phantoms on the ground,
Stretch their dreamy length forever,
On a daisy covered mound;
And I loved her, yes, I loved her,
But the Angels loved her too,
So she's sleeping in the valley,
Neath the sky so bright and blue.

And no slab of pallid marble
Rears its white and ghastly head,
Telling wanderers in the valley
Of the virtues of the dead.
But a lily is her tombstone,
And a dew-drop, pure and bright,
Is the epitaph of an angel
Wrote in the stillness of night.

And I'm mournful, very mournful,
For my soul doth ever crave
For the fading of the shadows
From that little woodland grave,
For the memory of the loved one,
From my soul will never part,
And those shadows in the valley
Dim the sunshine of my heart.