Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
Nelly
By Irwin Russell (18531879)N
My soul heard no discordant tone,
For love and youth’s sweet matin song
It hearkened to, and that alone;
Strange music, in a harsher key,
For every sound a dirge appears
Since Nelly died, who lived for me.
Eternal winter reigns instead;
For how, for me, could summer last,
When she, my only rose, is dead?
As once, my day, my only light!
But thou art gone—the sun has set—
And every day, to me, is night.
Let no more suns arise for me:
For night can soothe my heart to sleep,
And, Nelly, then I’ll dream of thee!