Poems (Odom)/To Colonel T. L. Odom

TO COL. T. L. ODOM.

Into a valley of sombre shade,
With never a ray of light,
My sorrowful heart, all cold and dumb,
Was wrapped in a starless night.

Where once an altar of roses stood
In the light of a sun-lit day,
The darkness lay on a silent shrine,
The flowers had fallen away,

And over the marble death had crept
Like mildew over a tomb,
Even the ashes love had left
Were lost in the chilling gloom,

When suddenly, flashing through the night,
A star of the grandest power
Threw its radiant, brilliant light
Over life's drooping flower;

And down on the pale-white altar fell
A silvery, sparkling beam,
My heart grew warm and my bosom stirred
To the touch of a heavenly dream.

I watched the ashes gather again,
And burst into vivid flame,
While into my aching, sorrowful heart
A gleam of its glory came;

As though some pitying angel rent
The veiling of midnight cloud,
Letting the light of a joyous hope
Shine over my spirit's shroud.

And musical voices seemed to float
On the breast of the silence there;
Softly singing the song of love
To the pulse of the sighing air.

The flame on the altar flashed and burned,
The roses burst into bloom,
Their fragrance fell on the marble shrine
In showers of rare perfume.

A pure bright light has crowned again
The circle of coming years.
Thank God! my heart has drained at last
Its chalice of grief and tears.