Oops, forgot to close my italicization above -- could someone please assist me with the clean-up?

Here's another version, printed in Iowa News (DuBuque, Wisconsin Territory) on July 29th, 1837, p.4 (link)

THE QUESTION

"Where does my father stay so long,
Mother from you and I?
Why does he not return again?
Why do you weep and sigh?
Three months, you said, he would remain,
And leave us all aloneL
Yet by the winter's storm and snow,
Twelve months have passed and gone.

"Where is his tall and gallant ship
You took me once to see;
Its colors deck'd, its white sails speck'd
The deep blue summers sea?
Mother, I think I see him now,
He waved his hat and hand,
His last words were --- 'God bless you both;'
When we stood on the strand.

"How well I now remember him,
He held me on his knee,
There is a bird and fruit he brought
From the far off Indian tree;
All other ships are coming in,
Parting the white waves foam:
When will my father's ship return,
Or when will he come home?"

"Thy father tarried long, my child,
Upon the distant main;
The hurricane the ocean swept,
He'll ne'er return again.
His gallant ship, my gentle boy,
It rests beneath yon wave;
That placid, calm and shining sea
Flows o'er thy father's grave!"

"Again you weep, my mother dear,
Shall we not see him more?"
"Ask if the deep and fathomless
The dead again restore.
My child, thou art the only tie
This world has left to me,
There is a heaven beyond the sky,
A home for him and thee."