Julie (Wetherill) Baker (1858– )

THOU canst not rob me of that happy day,

Though joy from out earth’s choral song has ceased,

And all things pass, the greatest as the least.

So may the red rose weep its leaves away,

And summer from her sumptuous prime decay,

And silence fall upon the season’s feast,

And darkness on the dawn-enkindled east,

Whence the sun leaps with bright and beckoning ray:

That day was mine. And as the lonely years

Wind downward toward death’s door that glooms afar,

One memory shall banish all my fears,—

A talisman that naught can dull or mar,—

And I shall see it, from the way of tears,

Shine ’mid the grave-dust like a fallen star.