From the bright stars, or from the viewless air, <br />Or from some world unreached by human thought, <br />Spirit, sweet spirit! if thy home be there, <br />And if thy visions with the past be fraught, <br />Answer me, answer me! <br /> <br />Have we not communed here of life and death? <br />Have we not said that love, such love as ours, <br />Was not to perish as a rose's breath, <br />To melt away, like song from festal bowers? <br />Answer me, answer me! <br /> <br />Thine eye's last light was mine - the soul thtat shone <br />Intensely, mournfully, through gathering haze - <br />Didst thou bear with thee to the shore unknown, <br />Nought of what lived in that long, earnest gaze! <br />Hear, hear, and answer me! <br /> <br />Thy voice - its low, soft, fervent, farewell tone <br />Thrilled through the tempest of the parting strife, <br />Like a faint breeze: - oh, from that music flown, <br />Send back <br />one <br />sound, if love's be quenchless life, <br />But once, oh! answer me! <br /> <br />In the still noontide, in the sunset's hush, <br />In the dead hour of night, when thought grows deep, <br />When the heart's phantoms from the darkness rush, <br />Fearfully beautiful, to strive with sleep - <br />Spirit! then answer me! <br /> <br />By the remembrance of our blended prayer; <br />By all our tears, whose mingling made them sweet <br />By our last hope, the victor o'er despair; - <br />Speak! if our souls in deathless yearnings meet; <br />Answer me, answer me! <br /> <br />The grave is silent: - and the far-off sky, <br />And the deep midnight - silent all, and lone! <br />Oh! if thy buried love make no reply, <br />What voice has earth! - Hear, pity, speak, mine own! <br />Answer me, answer me!<br /><br />Felicia Dorothea Hemans<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-a-departed-spirit/
