Most lives lie more in the shadow, I think, than in the sun,
And the shadow from some is lifted only when life is done;
And so, though I wear mourning, I am glad at heart to know,
She rests in her still white slumber, under the Christmas snow.

She was to have married Philip. He sailed with his ship in June.
How long they walked by the sea that night, under the waning moon!
'A year and a day of parting, and a lifetime, sweet, with you.'
Ah me, but we dream life bravely, if only our dreams came true!

She spoke of him very little: 'twas never her way to talk;
But the restless nights, the restless days, the long, long tireless walk,
Forever beside the ocean. I fancied, almost, there grew
A picture of ocean within her eyes. & tend'rest eyes I knew!

Forever the ocean! Until her heart seemed even to time its beat
With the pulse and the throb of the waters that drifted to her feet;
She smiled when the sea was smiling, and her face in the tempest roar
Grew white as the fury of breakers, that beat on the rocky shore.

Again and again in dead of night, I wakened to find—ah me!—
The still, white form at the window that looked on the lonely sea.
Forever and ever the ocean! And I thought, with yearning pain,
'If only the year were over, and Philip were back again!'

June passed into December. We were merry at Christmas-tide.
Berry and oak and holly, and folk from the country-side;
Music and feast and frolic, laughter and life and light—
I never missed poor Maggie, till far into the night.

Why should I think of the saying, somewhere that I had read:
'Pray for the one beloved, if he be living or dead,
In the hush of the Christmas midnight he will appear to thee.'
O Maggie, sister Maggie, down by the moaning sea!—

Still as a ghost in the moonlight; white as the drifted snow;
Cold as the pitiless waters, surging to and fro.
Why are your arms extended—what do your eyes behold?
O Maggie, sister Maggie, never your lips have told!

I do not like to speak it. You surely will understand.
She was always gentle and harmless;—nay, when the days were bland,
Quite happy, I think; but in winter, when winds and waves were high,
She would shudder at times, and utter a pitiful, moaning cry.

And 't was strange how she loved painting;—her pictures ever the same:
An inky sea, an inky sky, and the lightning's forked flame;
A sinking ship, and a face—Phil's face—so like, 'twould make you start—
Just seen through the closing waters. It almost broke my heart!

Ah, well! it is over! Philip? No, we have never heard.
I loved him next to Maggie. 'T is hard to have had no word.
But for her, though I wear mourning, I am glad at heart to know
She lies in her quiet slumber, in the peace of the Christmas snow.