Showing posts with label Francis S Smith. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Francis S Smith. Show all posts
I'm a big believer in the notion that poetry belongs to the reader.  Actually, I'd like to expand that to the world belongs to the individual.  Interpret and enjoy at will.  To that end, in my world, this poem is about a burgeoning banshee.

THE WAIL OF THE BETRAYED
by Francis S. Smith


Come, night, sad night, and let me hide
My wretchedness in thee!
Nurse in thy gloom my woman's pride,
My heart's deep agony!
Thy sombre shadows suit me well,
My trouble and unrest
Are suited to thy darksome spell—
'Tis night within my breast.

The flowers that bloom at early morn
To some may beauteous be,
But those that ope at night's approach
Are dearer far to me.
The first like sunshine friends may smile
In fortune's happy light,
The latter will our griefs beguile
In sorrow's gloomy night.

Though bright the glorious orb of day,
It has no charm for me;
I would not have a single ray
Shine on my misery.
Like the crushed flower upon the plain,
Dust-covered from the sight,
So would I hide my loathsome stain
In everlasting night.

I love the dark-robed night, for she
Shares all my bitter grief;
She has a sigh in every breeze,
A tear on every leaf;
And while the moon looks sadly down,
The stars shed, as they glow,
A ray of sorrowing light that seems
Like sympathetic woe.
I liked this poem right up until the shot about a "better land where there is no October."  What an awful place that would be.  Luckily, I'll never have to live there.

ALL BORN IN OCTOBER
by Francis S. Smith


AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED TO F.S. STREET

Father, mother, and children three,
All members of one family,
A curious thing indeed to see—
All born in sad October.

No birthday record do they need;
If they the year and day but heed,
The month is very plain indeed—
For each it is October.

All came when leaves were brown and sere,
And nature's face was dark and drear,
The saddest season of the year—
The month of brown October.

But may no envious autumn come
To cast a shadow on their home,
And may their lives be sunshine from
October to October.

Around the white throne may they stand,
A still united, happy band,
When they have reached the " better land,"
Where there is no October.

Father, mother, and children three,
All members of one family,
A curious thing indeed to see-
All born in sad October.