Trust of Childhood.
An angel comes down from the realms of light,
To guard me in slumber, thro’ hours of the night;
Her presence is gentle, I feel she is there,
As soon as I’ve uttered my evening prayer;
So tenderly watching she stays in my room
Till darkness has folded his mantle of gloom.
I’ve felt on my forehead her soft finger tips
And the touch of her kiss, lightly pressed on my lips,
To waken me gently, ere leaving my bed,
When morning’s bright beauties o’er earth had been spread.
Forbearing to open my earth-gazing eyes
To look on the guardian sent from the skies,
I’ve listened and heard, e’en the rustle of wings;
And then at the casement, where mocking bird swings,
A sweeping of roses and jasmines I’ve heard,
And knew that their beauty and perfume were stirred
By her gossamer robes, as she hastened away,
To the rose-tinted gateway that opens to day;
(For Heaven, I know, is but little beyond,
Where glories of morn, in its borders have dawned);
And then by the holiness left in the room,
Afloat, like the fragrance from violet bloom,
I knew that a presence had surely been there,
Had left with me blessing, and wafted my prayer
To the throne of the Father for guidance and care.
* * * * *
O, trust of my childhood! bright halo of youth!
Come, veil for tonight the stern visage of truth;
With faith that’s elysian, I’d drift down the stream
To imagery islands, with beauty agleam,
And hear, as I heard in the far away years,
(Ere fancy’s young dream had been melted in tears),
A strain from a harp, floating over to me,
From a cloud-bannered sky, bending down to the sea,
Where golden-crowned angels could plainly be seen
With robings of white, in the glimmering sheen.
Then Heaven was near, and the curtain of blue
So thin, that at sunset the glory shone through;
Those silken illusions, inflated with joy,
Phylosophy’s hand has been swift to destroy;
And reason’s keen steel, that’s so cruelly cold,
Has cut thro’ the shimmer of heavenly gold,
And left but the hard-featured science of light
That will not be veiled for a dream of tonight.