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

To Mary.

Mary, amid the cares—the woes
Crowding around my earthly path,
(Sad path, alas! where grows
Not ev'n one lonely rose,)
My soul at least a solace hath
In dreams of thee, and therein knows
An Eden of sweet repose.

And thus thy memory is to me
Like some enchanted, far-off isle,
In some tumultuous sea—
Some lake beset as lake can be
With storms—but where, meanwhile,
Serenest skies continually
Just o'er that one bright island smile.

E. A. P.

For the Southern Literary Messenger.