92 THE CORAL INSECT. Yet he was present then— They were gathered for a bridal! And not like her's who wore them; THE CORAL INSECT. BY LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY. TOIL on! toil on! ye ephemeral train, Who build in the tossing and treacherous main; A fabric so vast, in a realm so drear. Ye bind the deep with your secret zone, THE CORAL INSECT. 93 Fresh wreaths from the coral pavement spring, But why do ye plant 'neath the billows dark With mouldering bones the deeps are white, Ye build-ye build--but ye enter not in, Like the tribes whom the desert devoured in their sin; From the land of promise ye fade and die, Ere its verdure gleams forth on your weary eye ; 04 TO A WATERFOWL. As the kings of the cloud-crowned pyramid, Ye slumber unmarked 'mid the desolate main, TO A WATERFOWL. BY W. C. BRYANT, WHITHER, 'midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, Thy figure floats along. Seek'st thou the plashy brink There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,-- Lone wandering, but not lost. |