The Southern Literary Messenger, Volume I., 1834-35

Hopes and Sorrows.

The fitful beam
Of the rippled fountain,
The purple gleam
Of the eve-lit mountain,
The vanishing glance
Of the meteors motion,
The lights that dance
On the darkened ocean,
Are the faithful types of the hopes that won us,
While the dew of our youth still sparkled upon us.

The arid sands
Of the sun-dried river,
The rock that stands
Where lightnings quiver,
The pitiless rush
Of the earthquake's ruin,
The startling hush
Of the sea-storm brewing,
Are as truly types of the sorrows that found us,
When the hopes that we nursed had all fled from around us.

For the Southern Literary Messenger.