The Cross of Snow

In the long, sleepless watches of the night,
     A gentle face -- the face of one long dead --
     Looks at me from the wall, where round its head
     The night-lamp casts a halo of pale light.
   Here in this room she died; and soul more white
     Never through martyrdom of fire was led
     To its repose; nor can in books be read
     The legend of a life more benedight.
   
There is a mountain in the distant West
    That, sun-defying, in its deep ravines
    Displays a cross of snow upon its side.
  Such is the cross I wear upon my breast
    These eighteen years, through all the changingscenes
    And seasons, changeless since the day she died.