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Marguerite; or, The Isle of Demons and Other Poems cover

Marguerite; or, The Isle of Demons and Other Poems

Chapter 37: VIGER SQUARE.[8]
By George Martin
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Poetry

About This Book

A varied collection of lyric and narrative verse centered on a long romantic legend about a woman’s ordeal on a haunted island and its personal and moral aftermath, accompanied by shorter sonnets, ballads, and occasional pieces. Many poems draw on Canadian history and local scenes, offering meditative nature writing, urban sketches of Montreal and Ottawa life, winter and carnival scenes, elegies and civic tributes, and moral or humorous vignettes about everyday people. Themes of love, exile, faith, memory, and social concern recur across diverse forms and voices, blending personal reflection with regional colour and historic atmosphere.

VIGER SQUARE.[8]

Here in this quiet garden shade, Whose blossoms spread their bloom before me, The world’s gay cheats,—Life’s masquerade, Like evil ghosts from memory fade, And calm and holy thoughts come o’er me.
Ambrosial haunt; the orient light Falls golden on thy soft seclusion; And like the lone and shadowy night, Grim care, abashed, has taken flight, And joys gleam forth in rich profusion.
These odorous flowers that feast the bee, Those mimic fountains sunward leaping, And yon red-berried rowan tree, That brings my childhood back to me, With hallowed scenes of Memory’s keeping.
All these, and more, with beauty clad, Invite the city’s weary mortals— The pale-faced maid, the widow sad, The sinking merchant, growing mad, To muse within these peaceful portals.
Here is the stone that sages sought, Here the famed lamp of blest Aladdin; Objects that tell ambitious thought, “All that thy greed hath ever caught Cannot like us, console and gladden.”

[8] A beautiful public park, in the east end of Montreal.