Felicia Dorothea Hemans

Lines Written for the Album at Rosanna

O, LIGHTLY tread through these deep chestnut bowers,
  Where a sweet spirit once in beauty moved!
And touch with reverent hand these leaves and flowers,—
  Fair things, which well a gentle heart hath loved!
A gentle heart, of love and grief the abode,
Whence the bright stream of song in tear-drops flowed.

And bid its memory sanctify the scene!
  And let the ideal presence of the dead
Float round, and touch the woods with softer green,
  And o’er the streams a charm, like moonlight, shed,
Through the soul’s depths in holy silence felt,—
A spell to raise, to chasten, and to melt!