LINES WRITTEN ON A PAGE OF A YOUNG GIRL’S ALBUM

AT RAGATZ, AUGUST 1889.

Just as a dream of music never heard
May charm our spirit with its mystic spell,
This little page without one written word
Speaks more than words can tell:
Fair as the unchanging fields of Alpine snow,
That hide the buried and the unborn spring,
Its silence guards all secrets that we know
And all that time may bring:
Bearing sweet memories of past hours held dear
For all whose youth is flying, or has flown,
And softly whispering in a maiden’s ear
A name as yet unknown.

J. C. C.

My love is fair and yet not made so fair
As though fed only with the sun and sky
For now some viewless vision fills the air
And laughing lips grow mute—she knows not why,
And on her eyelids fallen unaware
The shadow as of passing tears doth lie!
Of tears unwept, born of an unknown care
That dwells beyond the flight of memory.
Ah, sweet, into thy beauty there could come
No better thing: the earth that holds thy feet
Must bring earth’s stain upon them where they meet
The path not made for thee—and the wind’s breath
That speaks not unto others but is dumb,
Whispers to thee of Life and Love and Death.

J. C. C.

1875.