Beside The River

                                                                              Song,

                                                          Ded. To Miss Clara Watrous

Do you recall that low, red cot

      Beside the winding river;

Do you recall the meadow lot

      Whose grasses bend and quiver?

Do you recall the shaded walks

      Where you and I went straying,

Do you recall the happy talks

      When weary of our playing?

                   Refrain –

Beside the river so wide and blue,

Beside the river, O love with you;

Beside the river at sunset glow,

Beside the river so long ago!

Do you recall the moss-grown shore

      Beside the river flowing,

Where hand in hand we wandered o’er

      The ferns and grasses growing.

Do you recall the arching bows

      Which shielded oft love’s token,

Do you recall those tender vows

      Which still remain unbroken?

                   Refrain –

The river winds the same today,

      I seem to see it flowing;

But you and I are far away,

      And love we’re older growing.

But fate will lead us home once more

      Beside the river gliding,

And we will dwell upon its shore

      Our love fore’er abiding.

                   Refrain –

June 13, 1900

                                            

                                                                                                          Clara Watrous Stewart

                                                                           painted by Ivan G.Olinsky (b. Russia, died Old Lyme, Ct)

                                                                              photograph image #JUL J0115106, Smithsonian Inst.

                                                              http://collections.si.edu/search/results.htm?q=record_ID:siris_jul_115107

                                                      

                                                                                               gravestone, River View Cemetery

                                                                                                            East Haddam, Ct.

(As she was born six years later in the same town, and as the artist worked in an adjoining town, I am assuming that these may both be one and the same as the young lady to whom the poem is dedicated.)