A Flower's Song

Star! Star, why dost thou shine
Each night upon my brow?
Why dost thou make me dream the dreams
That I am dreaming now?

Star! Star, thy home is high --
I am of humble birth;
Thy feet walk shining o'er the sky,
Mine, only on the earth.

Star! Star, why make me dream?
My dreams are all untrue;
And why is sorrow dark for me
And heaven bright for you?

Star! Star, oh, hide thy ray,
And take it off my face;
Within my lowly home I stay,
Thou, in thy lofty place.

Star! Star, and still I dream,
Along thy light afar
I seem to soar until I seem
To be, like you, a star.

Abram Joseph Ryan

Abram Joseph Ryan was an American poet, Catholic priest, and former Confederate chaplain. Known as the 'Poet-Priest of the South,' his most famous work is 'The Conquered Banner.' Ryan wrote many poems that reflected his Southern heritage and the American Civil War. His works often possess a spiritual and melancholic tone, inspired by the losses of the war and his religious faith. In addition to poetry, he also wrote essays and gave public speeches.

Abram Joseph Ryan

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Pidgin

Suggested Poems

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The Star's Song

Flower! Flower, why repine?
God knows each creature's place;
He hides within me when I shine,
And your leaves hide His face.

And you are near as I to Him,
And you reveal as much
Of that eternal soundless hymn
Man's words may never touch.

God sings to man through all my rays
That wreathe the brow of night,
And walks with me thro' all my ways --
The everlasting light.

Flower! Flower, why repine?
He chose on lowly earth,
And not in heaven where I shine,
His Bethlehem and birth.

Flower! Flower, I see Him pass
Each hour of night and day,
Down to an altar and a Mass
Go thou! and fade away.

Fade away upon His shrine!
Thy light is brighter far
Than all the light wherewith I shine
In heaven, as a star.

Abram Joseph Ryan

At Night

    Dreary! weary!
    Weary! dreary!
Sighs my soul this lonely night.
    Farewell gladness!
    Welcome sadness!
Vanished are my visions bright.

    Stars are shining!
    Winds are pining!
In the sky and o'er the sea;
    Shine forever
    Stars! but never
Can the starlight gladden me.

    Stars! you nightly
    Sparkle brightly,
Scattered o'er your azure dome;
    While earth's turning,
    There you're burning,
Beacons of a better home.

    Stars! you brighten
    And you lighten
Many a heart-grief here below;
    But your gleaming
    And your beaming
Cannot chase away my woe.

    Stars! you're shining,
    I am pining --
I am dark, but you are bright;
    Hanging o'er me

Abram Joseph Ryan

To a Star.

    Dreary and dismal and dark
        Is the night of life to me,
    With nothing but clouds in the heaven above,
    Cruelly hiding the star that I love,
        Whose radiance was rapture to see.

    While the blasts from the cold frozen North
        Are biting right in to my soul -
    While the pitiless blasts from the bleak, barren shore
    Of the crystalline ocean incessantly roar,
        And the tempests that sweep from the pole.

    Oh! the gloom of the dark, dreary night,
        Concealing the star that I love!
    Oh! how bitter the anguish, bereft of its beam!
    While the beings around me are such that I seem
        In a dungeon of demons to move.

    Oh! when will the clouds clear away?
        And brighten the heaven abo...

W. M. MacKeracher

Zeila (A Story from a Star)

From the mystic sidereal spaces,
In the noon of a night 'mid of May,
Came a spirit that murmured to me --
Or was it the dream of a dream?
No! no! from the purest of places,
Where liveth the highest of races,
In an unfallen sphere far away
(And it wore Immortality's gleam)
Came a Being. Hath seen on the sea
The sheen of some silver star shimmer
'Thwart shadows that fall dim and dimmer
O'er a wave half in dream on the deep?
It shone on me thus in my sleep.

Was I sleeping? Is sleep but the closing,
In the night, of our eyes from the light?
Doth the spirit of man e'en then rest?
Or doth it not toil all the more?
When the earth-wearied frame is reposing,
Is the vision then veiled the less bright?
When the earth from our sight hath been taken,

Abram Joseph Ryan

Flowers And Stars.

"Beloved! thou'rt gazing with thoughtful look
    On those flowers of brilliant hue,
Blushing in spring tide freshness and bloom,
    Glittering with diamond dew:
What dost thou read in each chalice fair,
    And what does each blossom say?
Do they not tell thee, my peerless one,
    Thou'rt lovelier far than they?"

"Not so - not so, but they whisper low
    That quickly will fade their bloom;
Soon will they withered lie on the sod,
    Ravished of all perfume;
They tell that youth and beauty below
    Are doomed, alas! to decay,
And I, like them, in life's flower and prime
    May pass from this earth away."

"Too sad thy thoughts! Look up at yon stars,
    That gleam in the sapphire skies;
Not clearer their radiance, best beloved,
 ...

Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

Gone

S. M. A.



Gone! and there's not a gleam of you,
Faces that float into far away;
Gone! and we can only dream of you
Each as you fade like a star away.
Fade as a star in the sky from us,
Vainly we look for your light again;
Hear ye the sound of a sigh from us?
"Come!" and our hearts will be bright again.

Come! and gaze on our face once more,
Bring us the smiles of the olden days;
Come! and shine in your place once more,
And change the dark into golden days.
Gone! gone! gone! Joy is fled for us;
Gone into the night of the nevermore,
And darkness rests where you shed for us
A light we will miss ~forevermore~.

Faces! ye come in the night to us;
Shadows! ye float in the sky of sleep;
Shadows! ye bring nothing bright to us;...

Abram Joseph Ryan