All the bitter ingredients in thy cup of woe.
The hand of thy father that cup had prepared,
Each drop needful for thee, not one could be spared.
Ere thy first wound had healed, while bleeding and sore,
Death entered again, and a fair daughter bore
From home of her childhood, to return never more.
How painful the shock, for in striking that blow
A child, parent, sister, and wife was laid low.
Thy strength seemed unequal that shock to sustain,
But death was not satiate, he soon called again,
And tears and entreaties were powerless to save
Another dear daughter from death and the grave.
Like a fair lily when droops its young head,
With little of suffering her mild spirit fled.
She was thy namesake, to her young friends most dear;
So many thy trials, so heavy to bear,
It seemed that much longer thou couldst not survive;
_How much can the human heart bear and yet live_.
Up to this time there had always been one
Who shared in thy trials and made them his own;
Many years his strong arm had support been to thee,
The friend of thy youth, thy kind husband was he.
He's ever been with thee in weal and in woe,
But the time's just at hand when he too must go.
The bolt fell not single, it pierced the slight form
Of a child, too fragile to weather the storm;
The summons that took her dear father away
Seemed her young heart to break, she could not here stay,
And now in deep slumber they side by side lay.
I have felt, my dear friend, as I've witnessed thy grief,