Constance Journal

[Constance]

Sunset Meditation, Under The Apprehension Of Approaching Blindness In tremulous vision, falsely near, the forms of nature as phantoms appear, with the wonted colors of earth and sky, when o'er them wanders my fixless eye. O, let not one image from memory fade, that might dimly gleam the coming shade; be the parting aspect deeply impress, like a mother's glance ere she sank to rest! Shall I see those infant leaves, which now so lightly feather each waving bough, that scarce the descending orb they veil,-- shall I behold them wax sere and pale? Or must I, when Autumn's rustling breeze, strews the frost-tinged foliage round the trees, mournfully fancy the oak's ruddy brown, and the mountain-ash, drooping wanly down? And, when in this cottage-porch reclined, where the woodbine's tendrils sport in the wind, still clinging with all their early love, to the arch o'er which they climbed above,-- will the picture saved from oblivion's stream, resemble the trace of a vivid dream, and the scenes I never again can view, be imaged in fragments of heightened hue? Shall I only then from its tempered glow, the hour of the Western glories know? While memory's pencil may fondly seek, to repaint each amber and crimson streak, and truly combine to the mental gaze, the changeful tints of the cloud-wrapt blaze: All, all that could wring from the scorner's breast, a prayer to Creation's God--confest! Let gratitude's source unfailing be found, 'midst the desert of darkness spreading around! Tho' withdrawn, be the blessings ne'er forgot. Which have shed their balm o'er my varied lot: Not even the floweret of briefest day, which I've watched, dew-gemmed in the morning ray, till the beams that opened each blooming leaf, seem'd to cheer a bosom clouded with grief. But doubly endeared and ne'er to decline, the power to console me, my friend, is thine! If thoughts that dwell in the deep heart's core must be exchanged by the eye no more; if this were the last confiding token of all that thy look of love hath spoken;-- by the tender touch and the quivering tone, I should know the heart to be still my own. By: Joanna Baillie (not me)