67. EBB to Mary Moulton-Barrett

As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 1, 58–59.

[Hope End]

To my dearest dear Mama

On her birthday May 1st 1818 [1]

So supremely distinguished in the anals [sic] of our little lives and oh may Phebus celebrate this dear day with us

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Sweet soul of sacred Poetry

From Helicons sequestered fanes

From blest Triconias [sic for Tritonia’s] loveliest plain

To wake the lyre I call not thee

Untaught by art my lowly lay

Forth from my breast Affection springs

And sweeps the lyre’s rebounding strings

To greet a Parents natal day

Then hail dear harbinger of May

Protector of our early youth

Guide of our steps to sacred truth

And hail this fondly pleasing day,

Where sorrow sends the palm to mirth

Where grief is joy where woe is bliss

Where every pleasure yields to this

E’en thus to celebrate a Parents birth

If filial love could e’er have ta’en

From Heaven one blessing on thy state

The pleasure from the arms of fate

Thy children have not lived in vain–

nor has Elizth B Barrett

Address, on integral page: Mrs Barrett / Hope End–

Publication: None traced.

Manuscript: Berg Collection.

1. Her 37th birthday.

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