Claribel

I

In the greenest vale of a lovely wood
A pleasant little cottage stood,
And no place on earth was more good and fair
Than the modest hut in the valley there.

The sun, at the close of each happy day,
Would kiss it to sleep with his last gold ray,
And, still reluctant to say goodbye,
Caress its smoke that came curling by.

And he’d hasten around with his first soft beams
To kiss it awake from its quiet dreams;
Then, for his own sweet cottage’ sake,
He would kiss the rest of the world awake:

First would the red-breasted robin sing,
Then, in response to her twittering,
The sparrows, beginning to chirp and sigh,
Would announce to the world that day is nigh,

And all the sweet spirits of the air
Would flood with their song the valley fair,
Till at last soaring high would the skylark sing, –
And the spirit of morning would drop from her wing,

Stirring awake the green valley beneath:
The clover would stretch on the springy heath,
The daisies laugh with their jewels of dew,
The shy bluebells throw back the sky’s own blue,

The white lilies nod at the brook flowing by,
The red roses bare their sweet breasts to the sky,
And finally, rising from soft beds of peat,
The fleecy white lambs wake to gambol and bleat;

And the old man would hear them, and rise from his bed
To see that his dear flock was tended and fed,
And he’d work at his pleasant light tasks, until when
The setting sun kissed him goodnight again.

Nor was he alone in his valley fair,
For the old man had a daughter there;
Together they lived in their simple way,
As day melted into happy day.

She was his darling, his joy, his life,
And no man loved mother – sister – wife –
With a love so earnest and selfless and mild
As the love the man had for his darling child;

And she – she was worthy of all his love:
As gentle and meek as the softest dove,
As lovely and pure as the whitest pearl,
As fresh as the dew, was the tender girl.

Wherever she passed the larks followed along,
And sought her delight with their merriest song;
The bluebells all glowed with a happier blue
Whenever the little maid came into view;

The roses would waken at her lightest tread,
And tremble and blush a more beautiful red;
The brook would leap higher at her soft caress,
And proudly reflect back her sweet loveliness, –

There was never a creature more simple and fair
Than the maiden that lived in the green valley there,
And no sun ever shed a more beautiful ray
Than dropped from her loveliness day after day.

II

In all this green valley, good and fair,
There was only one place her sweet smile left bare, –
A sandstone cliff – and down below,
Not flowers, but briars and thorns did grow.

Now this crag was the place that the child loved best,
And she made of that hard ledge her own little nest:
There would she sit, not on soft moss or heath,
And gaze – not at roses – at sharp thorns beneath;

And so lovely a ray fell from her lovely face,
And all Spring-like she scattered so charming a grace,
That in all the green valley so fresh and fair
No beauty could vie with the loveliness there.

So sweet was this child, so lovely the scene,
So happy the hour, the fair vale so green, –
That I weep to recall it – shudder to tell
In this wide-wretched world – of the death-stroke that fell:

For one day as she sat there, far out on the edge,
That cold cliff deceived her – the murderous ledge,
It crumbled beneath our seraphic-sweet girl,
And cast to the briars the world’s dearest pearl;

– And why proceed further? what profit to speak
Of the sad tears that streamed down her pure white cheek,
Of how her soft bosom was scratched and torn
As her milky breast strove with the iron thorn,

How her fast-flowing blood ran into the clay,
Staining it red to this very day: –
Why seek a cause? why wonder why?
She was fair while she lived – yet she lived to die.

A change came over the valley green,
(Now Is can only mock Has Been),
For when from the Life of the countryside
The life-blood flowed – that valley died.

The robins lost their will to sing,
The sparrows ceased their twittering,
The mute lark fled from the grey-grown sky,
The laughing brook began to cry,

The roses folded their red breasts up,
And one by one began to drop;
The blueness from every bluebell fled,
As lower dropped each lifeless head;

The clover died, and the lonely peat,
Now pressed no more by white lambs’ feet;
And after every tone and hue
Had fled the vale – the man died too.

Now the sunless vale is dark and dead,
Save one glowing spot of red, –
For there where the cruel briar grows,
Where the fair maid died, – sprang up a rose.

III

I will not say, ‘It was best you know,
She had to die for the rose to grow’ –
Each hair on that darling head was worth
More than every rose on this loveless earth; –

This is all I know: she was kind and fair;
When she died that day, my heart died there;
I’ll shed my tear and sigh my sigh,
And trust she died in her great God’s eye, –

And so will I live from day to day:
This morning, when I passed by that way,
In the red-stained earth I dropped a tear,
And stooped to kiss the red rose there: –

Sorrow comes and beauty goes,
But lovely is the crimson rose:
I will not ask more, nor wonder why,
But live (like her) in my Maker’s eye,

Till I too, struggling and pale and worn,
Shall burst my heart on some great thorn,
And panting in the red-stained clay
Bleed all my little life away,

Moaning until my sweetheart, Death,
Shall ease me of my labored breath,
And lead me to where all is rest,
(Ah!) folded in my Savior’s breast.

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