{"id":106,"date":"2025-06-14T10:04:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-14T14:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/?page_id=106"},"modified":"2025-06-14T15:33:46","modified_gmt":"2025-06-14T19:33:46","slug":"anne-c-lynch-poems","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/verse\/anne-c-lynch-poems\/","title":{"rendered":"Anne C. Lynch Poems"},"content":{"rendered":"

Edited by Kevin Cawley from the enlarged edition (New York: Putnam, 1852).<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Anne Charlotte Lynch<\/b>, author, b. in Bennington, Vt., in 1820. Her father was a native of Dublin, Ireland, who, at the age of sixteen, joined the rebel forces under Lord Edward Fitzgerald. He was captured, and remained a prisoner four years, when, still refusing to take the oath of allegiance, he was banished, and came to the United States, where he married and died a few years later. His daughter was educated in Albany, N.Y., and began early to write for literary periodicals. She removed to Providence, R.I., and there edited the “Rhode Island Book<\/a>” containing selections from authors of that state (Providence, 1841). Soon afterward she returned to New York, where she has since resided, and in 1855 married Prof. Botta. Their house has been for many years open to a wide range of literary and artistic people, and Mrs. Botta’s receptions have been attended by many of the most famous authors, painters, and musicians of Europe and America. During the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71) an effort was made in New York city to collect funds for the suffering women and children of Paris. Mrs. Botta prepared as her contribution an album of autographs, photographs, and original sketches by celebrated artists, which was sold for $5,000. As the war had closed before the collection was complete, this sum was appropriated to found a prize at the French academy, to be awarded every five years, when the interest of this sum reached $1000, for the best essay on the “Condition of Woman.” Mrs. Botta’s style is musical, elegant, and finished. Among her best poems are “Paul at Athens” “Webster,” Books,” and “Wasted Fountains” Her sonnets\u00a0are especially successful. She has published in periodicals innumerable stories, essays, and criticisms. The first collected edition of her poems (New York, 1848; new ed., 1884) was illustrated by Brown, Darley, Durand, Huntington, and other artists. Her “Leaves from the Diary of a Recluse<\/a>” appeared in “The Gift” for 1845. She has also published a “Handbook of Universal Literature”<\/a>, containing concise accounts of great authors of all ages and their works, which has been adopted as a text-book in many educational institutions.– Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography<\/i> edited by James Grant Wilson and John Fiske (New York: Appleton, 1887).<\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

DEDICATION.
\nTO MY MOTHER.<\/p>\n

THE flowers of romance that I cherished,
\nAround me lie withered and dead;
\nThe stars of my youth’s shining heaven,
\nWere but meteors whose brightness misled;
\nAnd the day-dreams of life’s vernal morning,
\nLike the mists of the morning have fled.<\/p>\n

But one flower I have found still unwithered;
\nLike the night-scented jasmin it gleams;
\nAnd beyond where the fallen stars vanished,
\nOne light pure and hallowed still beams;
\nOne love I have found, deep and changeless,
\nAs that I have yearned for in dreams.<\/p>\n

Too often the links have been broken,
\nThat bound me in friendship’s bright chain
\nToo often has fancy deceived me
\nTo blind or to charm me again;
\nAnd I sigh o’er my young heart’s illusions,
\nWith a sorrow I would were disdain.<\/p>\n

But now, as the clouds return earthward,
\nFrom the cold and void ether above;
\nAs on pinions all drooping and weary,
\nO’er the waste flew the wandering dove;
\nO’er the tide of the world’s troubled waters,
\nI return to the ark of thy love.<\/p>\n

Here, at length, my tired spirit reposes;
\nHere my heart’s strongest tendrils entwine;
\nHere its warmest and deepest affections
\nIt lays on earth’s holiest shrine
\nDearest mother, receive the devotion
\nOf the life thou hast given from thine.<\/p>\n

Here, pressed to thy bosom, the tempests
\nThat sweep over life’s stormy sea,
\nHave beat, in their impotent fury, —
\nThey were winged with no terror for me;
\nIf I shrank from the fearful encounter,
\nIf I trembled — it was but for thee.<\/p>\n

The spirit of Song that lies buried
\nIn silence or sleep in the breast,
\nUnlike the wild music of Memnon,
\nIs changed by the sunshine to rest;
\nIn the clash of contending emotions
\nAre its harmonies only expressed.<\/p>\n

When, at moments, my soul has been shaken,
\nIn the strife with the world’s rushing throng;
\nOr moved by some holier impulse,
\nAs borne by its current along;
\nThis spirit aroused, has responded,
\nAnd uttered these fragments of song.<\/p>\n

I know they are but passing echoes,
\nFor which time has no place and no name;
\nBut hereafter, in loftier numbers,
\nMight I seek for the guerdon of fame —
\nMight I gather its evergreen laurels —
\nI would twine them around thy loved name.<\/p>\n

But I mark now a pallor that deepens,
\nAnd spreads o’er thy brow and thy cheek;
\nAnd, filled with a fearful foreboding,
\nMy strong heart grows nerveless and weak;
\nAnd shrinks back appalled from the anguish,
\nThe blow beneath which it would break.<\/p>\n

Oh, leave me not yet, gentle spirit,
\nThough our loved and our lost, gone before,
\nIn the Better Land watch for thy coming,
\nAnd call thee away to that shore;
\nThese clasped arms are strong to detain thee —
\nLeave, leave me not yet, I implore!<\/p>\n

Oh God! let this cup but pass from me,
\nWhen thy bitterest draught would be thrown;
\nNot yet those sweet ties rend asunder
\nHeart with heart, life with life that have grown!
\nNot yet can I bear life’s great burden,
\nAnd tread its dark wine-press alone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE BATTLE OF LIFE.<\/p>\n

THERE are countless fields the green earth o’er,
\nWhere the verdant turf has been dyed with gore;
\nWhere hostile ranks in their grim array,
\nWith the battle’s smoke have obscured the day;
\nWhere hate has stamped on each rigid face
\nAs foe met foe in the death embrace;
\nWhere the groans of the wounded and dying rose,
\nTill the heart of the listener with horror froze,
\nAnd the wide expanse of the crimsoned plain
\nWas piled with its heaps of uncounted slain: —
\nBut a fiercer combat, a deadlier strife,
\nIs that which is waged in the Battle of Life.<\/p>\n

The hero that wars on the tented field,
\nWith his shining sword and his burnished shield,
\nGoes not alone with his faithful brand,
\nFriends and comrades around him stand;
\nThe trumpets sound and the war-steeds neigh,
\nTo join in the shock of the coming fray,<\/p>\n

And he flies to the onset, he charges the foe,
\nWhere the bayonets gleam and the red tides flow;
\nAnd he bears his part in the conflict dire,
\nWith an arm all nerve, and a heart all fire.
\nWhat though he fall! at the battle’s close,
\nIn the flush of victory won, he goes,
\nWith martial music and waving plume,
\nFrom a field of fame to a laurelled tomb.
\nBut the hero that wars in the Battle of Life,
\nMust stand alone in the fearful strife;
\nAlone in his weakness or strength must go,
\nHero or craven to meet the foe;
\nHe may not fly, — on that fated field,
\nHe must win or lose, he must conquer or yield.
\nWarrior who com’st to this battle now,
\nWith a careless step and a thoughtless brow,
\nAs if the field were already won;
\nPause, and gird all thy armor on.
\nMyriads have Come to this battle-ground,
\nWith a valiant arm and a name renowned,
\nAnd have fallen vanquished, to rise no more,
\nEre the sun was set, or the day half o’er.<\/p>\n

Dost thou bring with thee hither a dauntless will,
\nAn ardent soul that no blast can chill;
\nThy shield of Faith hast thou tried and proved;
\nCanst thou say to the mountain — ” Be thou moved;”
\nIn thy hand does the sword of truth flame bright;
\nIs thy banner emblazoned — “For God and the Right;”
\nIn the might of prayer, dost thou strive and plead?
\nNever had warrior greater need.
\nUnseen foes in thy pathway hide;
\nThou art encompassed on every side.
\nThere Pleasure waits, with her syren train,
\nHer poison flowers and her hidden chain;
\nHope, with her Dead Sea fruits, is there;
\nSin is spreading her gilded snare;
\nFlattery courts, with her hollow smiles;
\nPassion with silvery tone beguiles;
\nLove and Friendship their charmed spells weave:
\nTrust not too deeply, they may deceive.
\nDisease with a ruthless hand would smite,
\nand Care spread o’er thee a with’ring blight;
\nHate and Envy, with visage black,
\nAnd the serpent Slander are on thy track;
\nGuilt and Falsehood, Remorse and Pride,
\nDoubt and Despair in thy pathway glide;
\nHaggard Want, in her demon joy,
\nWaits to degrade thee and then destroy;
\nPalsied Age in the distance lies,
\nAnd watches his victim with rayless eyes;
\nAnd Death, the insatiate, is hovering near,
\nTo snatch from they grasp all thou holdest dear.
\nNo skill may avail, and no ambush hide,
\nIn the open field must the champion bide,
\nAnd face to face, and hand to hand,
\nAlone in his valor confront that band.
\nIn war with these phantoms that gird him round,
\nNo limbs dissevered may strew the ground;
\nNo blood may flow, andno mortal ear
\nThe groans of the wounded heart may hear,
\nAs it struggles and writhes in their dread control,
\nAs the iron enters the riven soul.
\nBut the youthful form grows wasted and weak,
\nAnd sunken and wan is the rounded cheek;
\nThe brow is furrowed, but not with years;
\nThe eye is dimmed with its secret tears,
\nAnd streaked with white is the raven hair:
\nThese are the tokens of conflict there.<\/p>\n

The battle is over; the hero goes,
\nScarred and worn, to his last repose.
\nHe has won the day, he has conquered Doom,
\nHe has sunk unknown to his nameless tomb.
\nFor the victor’s glory no voices plead,
\nFame has no echo, and earth no meed.
\nBut the guardian angels are hovering near;
\nThey have watched unseen o’er the conflict here,
\nAnd they bear him now, on their wings away,
\nTo a realm of peace, — to a cloudless day.
\nEnded now is the earthly strife,
\nAnd his brow is crowned with the Crown of Life.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ASPIRATION.
\nSONNET.<\/p>\n

THE planted seed consigned to common earth,
\nDisdains to moulder with the baser clay;
\nBut rises up to meet the light of day,
\nSpreads all its leaves, and flowers, and tendrils forth;
\nAnd, bathed and ripened in the genial ray,
\nPours out its perfume on the wandering gales,
\nTill in that fragrant breath its life exhales.
\nSo this immortal germ within my breast
\nWould strive to pierce the dull, dark clod of sense,
\nWith aspirations wing\u00e9d and intense;
\nWould so stretch upward, in its tireless quest,
\nTo meet the Central Soul, its source, its rest;
\nSo in the fragrance of the immortal flower,
\nHigh thoughts and noble deeds, its life it would outpour.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A THOUGHT BY THE SEA-SHORE.<\/p>\n

“Even in our ashes live their wonted fires.”<\/p>\n

Bury me by the sea,
\nWhen on my heart the hand of Death is press\u00e9d.
\nIf the soul lingers ere she join the bless\u00e9d,
\nAnd haunts awhile her clay,
\nThen ‘mid the forest shades I would not lie,
\nFor the green leaves, like me, would droop and die.<\/p>\n

Nor ‘mid the homes of men,
\nThe haunts of busy life, would I be laid:
\nThere ever was I lone, and my vexed shade
\nWould sleep unquiet then:
\nThe surging tide of life might overwhelm
\nThe shadowy boundaries of the silent realm.<\/p>\n

No sculptured marble pile,
\nTo bear my name, be reared upon my breast, —
\nBeneath its weight my free soul would not rest;
\nBut let the blue sky smile,
\nThe changeless stars look lovingly on me,
\nAnd let me sleep beside this sounding sea —<\/p>\n

This ever-beating heart
\nOf the great Universe; here would the soul
\nPlume her soiled pinions for the final goal,
\nEre she should thence depart, —
\nHere would she fit her for the high abode, —
\nHere, by the sea, she would be nearer God.<\/p>\n

I feel His presence now,
\nThou mightiest of his vassals, as I stand
\nAnd watch beside thee on the sparkling sand,
\nThy crested billows bow;
\nAnd, as thy solemn chant swells through the air,
\nMy spirit, awed, joins in thy ceaseless prayer.<\/p>\n

Life’s fitful fever o’er,
\nHere then would I repose, majestic sea;
\nE’en now faint glimpses of eternity
\nCome o’er me on thy shore:
\nMy thoughts from thee to highest themes are given,
\nAs thy deep distant blue is lost in Heaven.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON THE DEATH OF MRS. N. P. WILLIS.<\/p>\n

In life’s freshness, and its fulness, —
\nIn thy womanhood’s young bloom,
\nWhile thy brow was all unclouded
\nWith a darkening ray of gloom, —
\nThe Angel Death hath said to thee,
\n“Thy Father calls thee home.”<\/p>\n

And, as fades some lovely vision
\nIn the morning’s gathering light,
\nOr as sinks some unsphered radiance
\nFrom the starry crown of night,
\nOr as dies some burst of music, —
\nThou hast vanished from our sight.<\/p>\n

Far across the foaming waters,
\nFrom the country of thy birth,
\nFrom thy childhood’s friends and memories,
\nFrom thy father’s silent hearth,
\nA strange soil unveils its bosom,
\nAnd must clasp thee, earth to earth.<\/p>\n

But the soft Spring sky bends o’er thee,
\nAs thou goest to thy rest,
\nAnd Mount Auburn’s green recesses
\nSoon in beauty will be drest;
\nAnd with waving leaves and blossoms,
\nWelcome in their lovely guest.<\/p>\n

And when Summer all her glory
\nO’er that hallowed scene shall shed,
\nThen shall come the loved and living,
\nWith hushed voice and noiseless tread;
\nAnd with tears bedew the flowers,
\nIn that city of the dead.<\/p>\n

There, where winds sigh through the pine trees,
\nWhere the silver water flows;
\nWhere the pale stars keep their vigils,
\nAnd the genial sunlight glows,
\nOh, how calm will be thy slumber!
\nHow I envy thy repose!<\/p>\n

There, young mother, — with thy nursling
\nSafely pillowed on thy heart,
\nSafely shielded from the tempest,
\nFrom the poison and the dart, —
\nYe will fade away together,
\nAs the violets depart.<\/p>\n

But not thus, oh gentle stranger,
\nShall thy loved remembrance flee;
\nIn the hearts where thou wast cherished,
\nThe sweet memories of thee,
\nLike the evergreens above thee
\nFresh and beautiful shall be.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nON SEEING THE IVORY STATUE OF CHRIST.<\/p>\n

The enthusiast brooding in his cell apart
\nO’er the sad image of the Crucified, —
\nThe drooping head, closed lips and pierc\u00e9d side, —
\nA holy vision fills his raptured heart;
\nWith heavenly power inspired, his unskilled arm
\nShapes the rude block to this transcendent form.
\nOh Son of God! thus, ever thus, would I
\nDwell on the loveliness enshrined in Thee;
\nThe lofty faith, the sweet humility;
\nThe boundless love, the love that could not die.
\nAnd as the sculptor, with thy glory warm,
\nGave to this chiselled ivory thy fair form,
\nSo would my spirit, in thy thought divine,
\nGrow to a semblance, fair as this, of Thine.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON A PICTURE OF HARVEY BIRCH.<\/p>\n

I know not if thy noble worth
\nMy country’s annals claim,
\nFor in her brief, bright history
\nI have not read thy name.<\/p>\n

I know not if thou e’er didst live;
\nSave in the vivid thought
\nOf him who chronicled thy life
\nWith silent suffering fraught.<\/p>\n

Yet, in thy history I see
\nFull many a great soul’s lot;
\nWho joins that martyr-army’s ranks,
\nThat the world knoweth not; —<\/p>\n

Who cannot weep “melodious tears,”
\nFor fame or sympathy;
\nBut who, in silence, bear their doom
\nTo suffer and to die; —<\/p>\n

For whom no poet’s harp is struck,
\nNo laurel wreath is twined;
\nWho pass unheard — unknown, away,
\nAnd leave no trace behind; —<\/p>\n

Who, but for their unwavering trust
\nIn Justice, Truth, and God,
\nWould faint upon their weary way,
\nAnd perish by the road.<\/p>\n

Truth, Justice, God! Oh mighty faith,
\nTo bear us up unharmed;
\nThe gates of Hell may not prevail
\nAgainst a soul so armed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THOUGHTS IN A LIBRARY.<\/p>\n

Speak low — tread softly through these halls;
\nHere genius lives enshrined, —
\nHere reign, in silent majesty,
\nThe monarchs of the mind.<\/p>\n

A mighty spirit-host they come,
\nFrom every age and clime;
\nAbove the buried wrecks of years,
\nThey breast the tide of Time.<\/p>\n

And in their presence-chamber here,
\nThey hold their regal state,
\nAnd round them throng a noble train,
\nThe gifted and the great.<\/p>\n

Oh, child of Earth! when round thy path
\nThe storms of life arise,
\nAnd when thy brothers pass thee by,
\nWith stern, unloving eyes, —<\/p>\n

Here shall the Poets chant for thee
\nTheir sweetest, loftiest lays;
\nAnd Prophets wait to guide thy steps
\nIn wisdom’s pleasant ways.<\/p>\n

Come, with these God-anointed kings,
\nBe thou companion here;
\nAnd in thy mighty realm of mind,
\nThou shalt go forth a peer!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LINES
\nTO ONE WHO WISHED TO READ A POEM I HAD WRITTEN.<\/p>\n

Nay, read it not, thou wouldst not know
\nWhat lives within my heart,
\nFor from that fount it does not flow;
\n‘Tis but the voice of Art.<\/p>\n

I could not bid my proud heart speak,
\nBefore the idle throng;
\nRather in silence would it break
\nWith its full tide of Song.<\/p>\n

Yes, rather would it break, than bare,
\nTo cold and careless eyes,
\nThe hallowed dreams that linger there,
\nThe tears and agonies.<\/p>\n

My lyre is skillful to repress
\nEach deep, impassioned tone;
\nIts gushing springs of tenderness
\nWould flow for one alone.<\/p>\n

The rock, that to the parching sand
\nWould yield no dewy drop,
\nStruck by the pilgrim prophet’s want,
\nGave all its treasure up.<\/p>\n

My heart then, is my only lyre;
\nThe prophet hath not spoken,
\nNor kindled its celestial fire;
\nSo, let its chords be broken.<\/p>\n

I would not thou shouldst hear those lays,
\nThough harsh they might not be;
\nThough thou, perchance, might’st hear and praise,
\nThey would not speak of me.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

AN IMITATION.<\/p>\n

As once I dreamed, methought I strayed
\nWithin a snow-clad mountain’s shade;
\nFrom whose far height the silence bore
\nOne charm\u00e9d word, “Excelsior!”<\/p>\n

And, as upon my soul it fell,
\nIt bound me with a fearful spell;
\nIt shut the sweet vale from my sight,
\nAnd called me up that dazzling height.<\/p>\n

I could not choose but heed its tone,
\nAnd climb that dreary path alone;
\nAnd now around me hung the gloom,
\nWhere the storm-spirit makes his home.<\/p>\n

Upon my head the tempests beat;
\nDark caverns opened at my feet;
\nThe thunders rolled, the lightnings flashed
\nAnd fierce the swollen torrents dashed.<\/p>\n

‘Twas gained, that mountain’s stormy pass;
\nBut, chilled beside a mer de glace<\/em>,
\nMy heavy heart in vain would soar, —
\nThe heart hears not “Excelsior!”<\/p>\n

The heart’s home is the vale below,
\nWhere kind words greet, where fond eyes glow;
\nIt withers ‘neath those frozen skies,
\nWhere the aspiring thought would rise.<\/p>\n

Above me the eternal snows
\nIn the cold sunlight’s glare arose,
\nAnd a dread Presence seemed to brood
\nO’er the appalling solitude.<\/p>\n

But now, on that unquiet dream,
\nDid one of stateliest aspect beam;
\nWhose brow thought’s kingly impress bore,
\nWhose soul thrilled to “Excelsior!”<\/p>\n

Though but one moment o’er my way
\nDid the bright form beside me stay;
\nIn that pale brow and speaking eye,
\nMethought I saw my Destiny!<\/em><\/p>\n

And as, far up the heaven-crowned height,
\nThou seem\u00e9dst to vanish from my sight;
\nThine image yet beside me stood,
\nAnd filled the voiceless solitude.<\/p>\n

No longer drear that mountain waste.
\nFor o’er its snows thy steps had passed;
\nNo longer dread, in upper air,
\nThat mountain’s crest, for thou wert there!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY-DAWN IN ITALY.<\/p>\n

Italia! in thy bleeding heart,
\nI thought, e’en hope was dead;
\nThat from thy scarred and prostrate form,
\nThe spark of life had fled.<\/p>\n

I thought, as Memory’s sunset glow
\nIts radiance o’er thee cast,
\nThat all thy glory and thy fame
\nWere buried in the past.<\/p>\n

Twice Mistress of the world! I thought
\nThy star had set in gloom;
\nThat all thy shrines and monuments
\nWere but thy spirit’s tomb.<\/p>\n

The mausoleum of the world,
\nWhere Art her spoils might keep;
\nWhere pilgrims from all shrines might come,
\nTo wonder and to weep.<\/p>\n

The thunders of the Vatican
\nHad long since died away;
\nSaint Peter’s chair seemed tottering,
\nAnd crumbling to decay.<\/p>\n

Thy ancient line of Pontiff Kings
\nWas to the past allied;
\nAnd oft in Freedom’s holy wars
\nThey fought not on her side.<\/p>\n

The sacred banner of the Cross
\nWas trailing, soiled and torn;
\nAnd often had the hostile ranks
\nThat blessed ensign borne.<\/p>\n

But from her death-like slumber now,
\nThe seven-hilled city wakes:
\nItalia! on thy shrouded sky,
\nA gleam of morning breaks.<\/p>\n

Along the Alps and Appenines
\nRuns an electric thrill;
\nA golden splendor lights once more
\nThe Capitolian hill.<\/p>\n

And hopes, bright as thy sunny skies,
\nAre o’er thy future cast;
\nThe future that upon thee beams,
\nAs glorious as thy past.<\/p>\n

The laurels that thy Caesars wore,
\nWere dyed with crimson stains;
\nTheir triumphs glittered with the spoil
\nWon on thy battle plains.<\/p>\n

But for thy Pontiff Prince, to-day,
\nA laurel might’st thou twine,
\nUnsullied as the spotless life
\nHe lays upon thy shrine.<\/p>\n

For him might the triumphal car
\nAscend the hill again;
\nNo slaves, bound to the chariot wheels,
\nShould swell the lengthened train: —<\/p>\n

Such train, as in her proudest days,
\nWas never seen in Rome, —
\nOf captives from the dungeon freed, —
\nOf exiles welcomed home.<\/p>\n

When, gazing on the doubtful strife,
\nThe Hebrew leader prayed,
\nThe friends of Israel gathered round,
\nHis drooping hands they staid.<\/p>\n

And thus around the Patriarch’s chair,
\nThe friends of Freedom stand, —
\nAll eager, though it falters not,
\nTo stay his lifted hand.<\/p>\n

And in a clearer, firmer tone,
\nIs heard their rallying cry;
\nFrom AEtna to the Alps it sounds:
\n“For God and Liberty!”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FROM DE VIGNY.<\/p>\n

Come on the sea, beloved,
\nFearless and free;
\nLeave friends and wealth behind;
\nCome, come with me.
\nMy bark on the water shines
\nA fairy thing; —
\nSee her pennon, mast, and keel!
\nShe is but a little shell,
\nYet there I am king.<\/p>\n

The earth was made for the slave,
\nOh maiden free!
\nBut for man, the stern and brave,
\nThe boundless sea.
\nThe waves breathe in their flow
\nA mystery,
\nAnd tenderly they sing,
\nIn their soft murmuring, —
\nLove, Liberty.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT.<\/p>\n

Why should we weep for thee,
\nSince thou hast gone unsullied back to heaven,
\nNo stain upon thy spirit’s purity,
\nNo sin to be forgiven?<\/p>\n

Love watched thee from thy birth,
\nFond hearts around thee tireless vigils kept;
\nAnd o’er thy tender soul the storms of earth
\nHad never rudely swept.<\/p>\n

Thou art spared a fearful lore —
\nA knowledge all attain who linger here;
\nThe changed, the cold, the dead, were words that bore
\nNo import to thine ear.<\/p>\n

Methought I saw in thee,
\nThus early as I marked by many a token,
\nA soul that might not war with Destiny,
\nA heart that could be broken.<\/p>\n

But sinless, tearless, gone,
\nUndimmed, unstained, who would not thus have died!
\nFor thee then let these vain regrets be done,
\nThese selfish tears be dried.<\/p>\n

Go to thy little bed!
\nThe verdant turf is springing fresh and fair,
\nThe flowers thou lovedst shall blossom o’er thy head,
\nThe spring birds warble there.<\/p>\n

And while to shapeless dust
\nThy cherub form is gently mouldering back,
\nOur thoughts shall upward soar, in hopeful trust,
\nOn thy freed spirit’s track.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TEACHING THE SCRIPTURES.<\/p>\n

Child of the thoughtful brow,
\nThe speaking eye and the confiding look!
\nList to those teachings now,
\nAnd make thy guiding star that Blessed Book.<\/p>\n

If bright thy course of life,
\n‘Twill shed around thy path a holier ray;
\nIf dark with storms and strife,
\n‘Twill beam like sunlight on thy dreary way.<\/p>\n

Come while around thee clings
\nThe joyousness and innocence of birth;
\nCome, ere thy spirit’s wings
\nAre wet with tears and stained with hues of earth.<\/p>\n

Like tendrils of the vine,
\nThose deep affections with thy heart inwove,
\nMust round some prop entwine;
\nThey ask some object for their wealth of love.<\/p>\n

And if that object be
\nEarth-born and mortal, they will languish still:
\nThere is a vacancy
\nIn woman’s heart, that God alone can fill.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nFAITH.<\/p>\n

Securely cabined in the ship below,
\nThrough darkness and through storm I cross the sea,
\nA pathless wilderness of waves to me:
\nBut yet I do not fear, because I know
\nThat he who guides the good ship o’er that waste
\nSees in the stars her shining pathway traced.
\nBlindfold I walk this life’s bewildering maze;
\nUp flinty steep, through frozen mountain pass,
\nThrough thornset barren and through deep morass:
\nBut strong in faith I tread the uneven ways,
\nAnd bare my head unshrinking to the blast,
\nBecause my Father’s arm is round me cast;
\nAnd if the way seems rough, I only clasp
\nThe hand that leads me with a firmer grasp.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WASHINGTON.
\nON HUNTINGTON’S PICTURE OF WASHINGTON
\nCROSSING THE ALLEGHANY IN EARLY LIFE.<\/p>\n

More proudly on thy winding course,
\nDark Alleghany! flow;
\nThe noblest burden thou couldst bear
\nIs on thy waters now.<\/p>\n

But calm be every turbid wave,
\nAnd hushed be wind and storm:
\nThere lies a Nation’s destiny
\nWithin that gallant form.<\/p>\n

A spirit that shall stem a tide
\nMore deep and dark than thine;
\nThat on a night of War shall bid
\nThe star of Victory shine.<\/p>\n

A spirit that through coming time
\nShall bear a hallowed name;
\nThe glory of old conquerors
\nShall pale before his fame.<\/p>\n

And young Ambition on his course
\nShall turn his eagle eye;
\nAnd men invoke his sainted shade
\nIn threat’ning anarchy.<\/p>\n

No baleful meteor shall he be,
\nTo dazzle from afar;
\nBut in the firmament of Fame
\nA fixed, a polar star!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ****, WITH FLOWERS.<\/p>\n

Go, ye sweet messengers,
\nTo that dim-lighted room,
\nWhere lettered wisdom from the walls
\nSheds a delightful gloom;<\/p>\n

Where sits in thought profound,
\nOne in the noon of life,
\nWhose flashing eye and fevered brow
\nTell of the inward strife;<\/p>\n

Who in those wells of lore,
\nSeeks for the pearls of truth,
\nAnd to Ambition’s fever dream
\nGives his repose and youth.<\/p>\n

To him, sweet ministers,
\nYe shall a lesson teach, —
\nGo in your fleeting loveliness
\nMore eloquent than speech.<\/p>\n

Tell him in laurel wreaths
\nNo perfume e’er is found,
\nAnd that upon a crown of thorns
\nThose leaves are ever bound.<\/p>\n

Thoughts fresh as your own hues
\nBear ye to that abode, —
\nSpeak of the sunshine and the sky,
\nOf Nature and of God.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO A CHILD.<\/p>\n

I love to look on that eye of blue,
\nFor tears have not yet worn a channel through;
\nAnd the few bright summers since thy birth,
\nHave left thee a stranger still on earth.<\/p>\n

A stranger — and all, to thine untaught eyes,
\nIs bright with the hues of paradise.
\nThe rapture of being thrills thy frame,
\nAnd sorrow thou know’st not even by name.<\/p>\n

Thy innocent thoughts, unswayed by art,
\nGush from the depths of thy guileless heart;
\nLike a harp when the wandering breezes sigh,
\nAnswering each touch with melody.<\/p>\n

I would, sweet one, I might wish for thee,
\nThat a stranger thus thou shouldst ever be;
\nThat time might not lift the enchanted veil,
\nNor breathe in thine ear his mournful tale.<\/p>\n

But those who are bid to this feast of life,
\nMust drink the cup, — must abide the strife: —
\nThen it were better to wish for thee,
\nStrength for the conflict, and victory.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

AN APOLOGY FOR SADNESS.<\/p>\n

When, in the miser’s eager gaze,
\nHis countless treasures lie,
\nThen most his coward spirit sinks,
\nWith dread of poverty.<\/p>\n

And when I felt within my grasp,
\nThe treasure of thy love;
\nThe insatiate avarice of the heart
\nFierce with my spirit strove.<\/p>\n

It troubled the clear fountain where
\nMy thirsting soul had quaffed,
\nAnd mingled tears of bitterness
\nWith the delicious draft.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A DIRGE FOR O’CONNELL.<\/p>\n

Throw open, once again,
\nThe portals of the tomb;
\nAnd give, among the glorious dead,
\nAnother hero room!<\/p>\n

Unclose your shadowy ranks,
\nIllustrious shades, unclose!
\nThe valiant Leader, crowned with years,
\nGoes down to his repose.<\/p>\n

The champion of Peace,
\nOn many a well-fought field,
\nWhose bloodless victories left no stain
\nOn his untarnished shield.<\/p>\n

A king, though on his brow
\nNo jewelled crown might shine;
\nA king, although his patriot blood
\nFlowed from no royal line.<\/p>\n

A sovereign o’er that realm,
\nNo boundaries can confine;
\nWhose throne was in a nation’s heart;
\nWho reigned by right divine.<\/p>\n

A soldier of the Cross,
\nWho bore a stainless brand;
\nThe preacher of a new Crusade,
\nTo rescue a lost land.<\/p>\n

Rome! to thy care is given
\nThe heart whose throbs are o’er;
\nEternal City! to thy charge
\nTake this one relic more!<\/p>\n

And Erin, sad and lorn!
\nTake thou the sacred trust;
\nAnd let the soil he loved so well,
\nCommingle with his dust.<\/p>\n

And Fame, take thou in charge
\nThe patriot’s renown;
\nAnd gather from your amaranth fields,
\nAnother fadeless crown!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nON A PICTURE OF THE VIRGIN.<\/p>\n

If the young mother clasp, for the first time,
\nThe mortal child that earthly love has given,
\nWith a deep joy preluding that of heaven;
\nWho shall describe thy ecstacy sublime,
\nOh Virgin mother! when upon thy ear
\nThe message of the announcing angel fell,
\nIn heavenly tones to calm thy rising fear,
\nAnd thy approaching glory to fortell.
\nWas ever mother so divinely blest,
\nAs when, the glow of Heaven yet clinging round him,
\nBefore the weight of human grief had bound him,
\nThe gentle Christ-child to thy heart was prest?
\nOh, blessed among women! joy like thine
\nWhat hand shall dare describe! alas, not mine.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LINES
\nTO FREDERIKA BREMER.<\/p>\n

“Hereafter, when I no more belong to earth, I should love to return to
\nit as a spirit, and impart to men the deepest of that which I have
\nsuffered and enjoyed, lived and loved. And no one need fear me; should
\nI come in the midnight hour to a striving and unquiet spirit, it would
\nbe only to make it more quiet, its night-lamp burn more brightly, and
\nmyself its friend and sister.” — Miss Bremmer’s Letter<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Hereafter! — nay, thou has thy wish e’en here;
\nTo many a striving spirit dost thou come,
\nSweet lady, from thy far-off northern home,
\nLike a blest presence from another sphere,
\nAnd love and faith, the night-lamps of the soul,
\nHave burned with brighter flame at thy control.<\/p>\n

A friend and sister art thou now to those
\nWho weep o’erburdened with life’s weary load,
\nAnd faint and toil-worn tread the desert road;
\nTo them thou beckonest from thy high repose:
\nThou’st gained that steep where endless day appears,
\nThat faith whose followers are baptized with tears.<\/p>\n

There came no voices from thy distant shore;
\nWe heard no echo of thy country’s lyres,
\nWe saw no gleaming of her household fires;
\nA cloud had hung thy land and language o’er,
\nUntil thy pictured thoughts broke on our eyes
\nLike an Aurora of thy native skies.<\/p>\n

Thy name is loved through all our fair wide land:
\nWhere the log-cabins of our western woods
\nAre scattered through the dim old solitudes,
\nWhere, glowing with young life, our cities stand,
\nThere go thy white-winged messengers, as went
\nOf old the angels to the patriarch’s tent.<\/p>\n

My harp is tuneless and unknown to fame;
\nA few weak chords, alas! chance-strung and frail,
\nO’er which sweeps fitfully the passing gale.
\nWould it indeed were worthier of its theme,
\nThat it might bear across the distant sea
\nThe homage of unnumbered hearts to thee.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE DUMB CREATION.<\/p>\n

Deal kindly with those speechless ones,
\nThat throng our gladsome earth;
\nSay not the bounteous gift of life
\nAlone is nothing worth.<\/p>\n

What though with mournful memories
\nThey sigh not for the past?
\nWhat though their ever joyous Now
\nNo future overcast?<\/p>\n

No aspirations fill their breast
\nWith longings undefined;
\nThey live, they love, and they are blest,
\nFor what they seek they find.<\/p>\n

They see no mystery in the stars,
\nNo wonder in the plain;
\nAnd Life’s enigma wakes in them
\nNo questions dark and vain.<\/p>\n

To them earth is a final home,
\nA bright and blest abode;
\nTheir lives unconsciously flow on
\nIn harmony with God.<\/p>\n

To this fair world our human hearts
\nTheir hopes and longings bring,
\nAnd o’er its beauty and its bloom
\nTheir own dark shadows fling.<\/p>\n

Between the future and the past
\nIn wild unrest we stand;
\nAnd ever as our feet advance,
\nRetreats the promised land.<\/p>\n

And though Love, Fame, and Wealth and Power,
\nBind in their gilded bond,
\nWe pine to grasp the unattained–
\nThe something still beyond.<\/p>\n

And, beating on their prison bars,
\nOur spirits ask more room,
\nAnd with unanswered questionings,
\nThey pierce beyond the tomb.<\/p>\n

Then say thou not, oh doubtful heart,
\nThere is no life to come;
\nThat in some tearless, cloudless land,
\nThou shalt not find thy home.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON A PICTURE.<\/p>\n

When Summer o’er her native hills
\nA veil of beauty spread,
\nShe sat and watched her gentle fold,
\nAnd twined her flaxen thread.<\/p>\n

The mountain daisies kissed her feet,
\nThe moss sprung greenest there;
\nThe breath of Summer fanned her cheek,
\nAnd tossed her wavy hair.<\/p>\n

The heather and the yellow gorse
\nBloomed over hill and wold,
\nAnd clothed them in a royal robe
\nOf purple and of gold.<\/p>\n

There rose the sky-lark’s gushing song;
\nThere hummed the laboring bee;
\nAnd merrily the mountain stream
\nRan singing to the sea.<\/p>\n

But while she missed from those sweet sounds,
\nThe voice she sighed to hear;
\nThe song of bee, and bird, and stream,
\nWas discord to her ear.<\/p>\n

Nor could the bright green world around
\nA joy to her impart,
\nFor still she missed the eyes that made
\nThe summer of her heart.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EVENING HYMN.<\/p>\n

On the swift flying hours
\nAnother bright day,
\nWith its tears and its smiles,
\nHas vanished away.
\nThou who dost number
\nOur days as they flee,
\nMay each that departs
\nBear us nearer to thee!<\/p>\n

On the wide sea of life
\nSoon our barks will be tost,
\nAnd the sweet ties that bind us
\nBe broken and lost.
\nFather in Heaven,
\nBe our guide to that shore,
\nWhere night never cometh,
\nWhere partings are o’er.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PAUL PREACHING AT ATHENS.<\/p>\n

Greece! hear that joyful sound,
\nA stranger’s voice upon thy sacred hill;
\nWhose tones shall bid the slumbering nations round,
\nWake with convulsive thrill.
\nAthenians! gather there; he brings you words
\nBrighter than all your boasted lore affords.<\/p>\n

He brings you news of One,
\nAbove Olympian Jove. One, in whose light
\nYour gods shall fade like stars before the sun.
\nOn your bewildered night,
\nThat UNKNOWN GOD of whom ye darkly dream,
\nIn all his burning radiance shall beam.<\/p>\n

Behold, he bids you rise
\nFrom your dark worship of that idol shrine;
\nHe points to Him who reared your starry skies,
\nAnd bade your Phoebus shine.
\nLift up your souls, from where in dust ye bow;
\nThat God of gods commands your homage now.<\/p>\n

But brighter tidings still!
\nHe tells of One whose precious blood was spilt,
\nIn lavish streams upon Judea’s hill,
\nA ransom for your guilt, —
\nWho triumphed o’er the grave, and broke its chain;
\nWho conquered Death and Hell, and rose again.<\/p>\n

Sages of Greece! come near —
\nSpirits of daring thought and giant mould.
\nYe questioners of Time and Nature, hear
\nMysteries before untold!
\nImmortal life revealed! light for which ye
\nHave tasked in vain your proud philosophy.<\/p>\n

Searchers for some first cause,
\n‘Midst doubt and darkness — lo! he points to One,
\nWhere all your vaunted reason, lost, must pause,
\nAnd faint to think upon, —
\nThat was from everlasting, that shall be
\nTo everlasting still, eternally.<\/p>\n

Ye followers of him
\nWho deemed his soul a spark of Deity!
\nYour fancies fade, — your master’s dreams grow dim
\nTo this reality.
\nStoic! unbend that brow, drink in that sound!
\nSkeptic! dispel those doubts, the Truth is found.<\/p>\n

Greece! though thy sculptured walls
\nHave with thy triumphs and thy glories rung,
\nAnd, through thy temples and thy pillared halls,
\nImmortal poets sung, —
\nNo sounds like these have rent your startled air,
\nThey open realms of light, and bid you enter there.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BOOKS FOR THE PEOPLE.<\/p>\n

“Let there be light.”<\/p>\n

Light to the darkened mind
\nBear, like the sun, the world’s wide circle round,
\nBright messengers that speak without a sound!
\nSight on the spirit blind
\nShall fall whene’er ye pass; your living ray
\nShall change the night of ages into day: —
\nGod speed ye on your way!<\/p>\n

In closet and in hall,
\nToo long alone your message hath been spoken:
\nThe spell of gold that bound ye there is broken;
\nGo forth and shine on all;
\nThe world’s inheritance, the legacy
\nBequeathed by Genius to the race are ye;
\nBe like the sunlight, free!<\/p>\n

A mighty power ye wield!
\nYe wake grim centuries from their deep repose,
\nAnd bid their hoarded treasuries unclose,
\nThe spoils of time to yield.
\nYe hold the gift of immortality;
\nBard, sage, and seer, whose fame shall never die,
\nLive through your ministry.<\/p>\n

Noiseless upon your path,
\nFreighted with lore, romance, and song, ye speed,
\nMoving the world, in custom and in creed,
\nWaking its love or wrath.
\nTyrants, that blench not on the battle-plain,
\nQuail at your silent coming, and in vain
\nWould bind the riven chain.<\/p>\n

Shrines, that embalm great souls!
\nWhere yet the illustrious dead high converse hold,
\nAs gods spake through their oracles of old;
\nUpon your mystic scrolls,
\nThere lives a spell to guide our destiny;
\nThe fire by night, the pillared cloud by day,
\nUpon our upward way.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO THE MEMORY OF CHANNING.<\/p>\n

“The Prophets, do they live forever?” — Zech. i. 5.<\/p>\n

Those spirits God ordained,
\nTo stand the watchmen on the outer wall,
\nUpon whose souls the beams of truth first fall;
\nThey who reveal the ideal, the unattained,
\nAnd to their age, in stirring tones, and high,
\nSpeak out for God, Truth, Man, and Liberty —
\nSuch prophets, do they die?<\/p>\n

When dust to dust returns,
\nAnd the freed spirit seeks again its God,
\nTo those with whom the blessed ones have trod;
\nAre they then lost? No, still their spirit burns
\nAnd quickens in the race; the life they give,
\nHumanity receives, and they survive,
\nWhile Hope and Virtue live.<\/p>\n

The landmarks of their age,
\nHigh Priests, Kings of the realm of mind, are they,
\nA realm unbounded as posterity;
\nThe hopeful future is their heritage;
\nTheir words of truth, of love, and faith sublime,
\nTo a dark world of doubt, despair, and crime,
\nRe-echo through all time.<\/p>\n

Such kindling words are thine,
\nThou, o’er whose tomb the requiem soundeth still,
\nThou from whose lips the silvery tones yet thrill
\nIn many a bosom, waking life divine;
\nAnd since thy Master to the world gave token
\nThat for Love’s faith the creed of fear was broken,
\nNone higher have been spoken.<\/p>\n

Thy reverent eye could see,
\nThough sinful, weak, and wedded to the clod,
\nThe angel soul still as the child of God,
\nHeir of His love, born to high destiny:
\nNot for thy country, creed, or sect speak’st thou,
\nBut him who bears God’s image on his brow
\nThy brother<\/em>, high or low.<\/p>\n

Great teachers formed thy youth,*
\nAs thou didst stand upon thy native shore,
\nIn the calm sunshine, in the ocean’s roar;
\nNature and God spoke with thee, and the truth,
\nThat o’er thy spirit then in radiance streamed,
\nAnd in thy life so calmly, brightly beamed,
\nShall still shine on undimmed.<\/p>\n

Ages agone, like thee,
\nThe fam\u00e9d Greek with kindling aspect stood,
\nAnd blent his eloquence with the wind and flood,
\nBy the blue waters of the Egean Sea;
\nBut he heard not their everlasting hymn;
\nHis lofty soul with error’s cloud was dim,
\nAnd thy great teachers spake not unto him.<\/p>\n

* “In this town I pursued my theological studies. I had no professor to guide me, but I had two noble places of study. One was yonder beautiful edifice, now so frequented as a public library; the other was the beach — the roar of which has so often mingled with the worship of this place — my daily resort; dear to me in the sunshine, still more attractive in the storm. Seldom do I visit it now without thinking of the work which there, in the sight of that beauty, in the sound of those waves, was carried on in my soul. No spot on earth has helped to form me so much as that beach. There I lifted up my voice in praise amidst the tempest. There, softened by beauty, I poured out my thanks-giving and contrite confessions. There, in reverential sympathy with the mighty power around me, I became conscious of the power within. There struggling thoughts and emotions broke forth, as if moved to utterance by Nature’s eloquence of winds and waves. There began a happiness surpassing all worldly pleasures — all gifts of fortune; — the happiness of communing with the work of <\/em>God.” — Dr. Channing’s Discourse at Newport, Rhode Island.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ODE
\nFOR THE FOURTH OF JULY.<\/p>\n

A glorious vision burst
\nOn Europe’s dazzled sight,
\nUpon that day when first
\nColumbia sprang to light; —
\nWhen our NEW WORLD, till then concealed,
\nIn virgin beauty stood revealed.<\/p>\n

But more sublime that day
\nWhen the young nation rose,
\nAnd cast her chains away,
\nAnd dared her tyrant foes:
\nThrones quaked, and despots trembled then,
\nFor bonds were rent and slaves were men.<\/p>\n

The torch of Liberty,
\nRelighted on that day,
\nStreamed over land and sea
\nWith brighter, holier ray.
\nHail to our Country! hail to thee,
\nAuspicious day that saw her free!<\/p>\n

Let the star-spangled flag
\nUpon the free air float;
\nLet hill, and vale, and crag,
\nProlong the cannon’s note:
\n“Live the Republic!” let this be
\nThe watch-word of our liberty.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ODE.<\/p>\n

Our patriot sires are gone,
\nThe conqueror Death lays low
\nThose veterans one by one,
\nWho braved each other foe; —
\nThough on them rests death’s sable pall,
\nYet o’er their deeds no shade shall fall.<\/p>\n

No, ye of deathless fame!
\nYe shall not sleep unsung,
\nWhile freedom hath a name,
\nOr gratitude a tongue; —
\nYet shall your names and deeds sublime
\nShine brighter through the mists of Time.<\/p>\n

Oh, keep your armor bright,
\nSons of those mighty dead,
\nAnd guard ye well the right,
\nFor which such blood was shed!
\nYour starry flag should only wave
\nO’er Freedom’s home, or o’er your grave.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.<\/p>\n

Oh! in that better land to which I go,
\nSay, shall I know thee as I know thee here;
\nAnd will thy presence dim that glorious sphere,
\nAs it hath darkened all the earth below?
\nOh! will that voice enchain my listening ear,
\nWhose “frozen music” stops my pulses now;
\nAnd shall I meet in that fair land of bliss
\nThose calm, cold eyes that chill me so in this?
\nShall I bear hence e’en memory<\/em>\u00a0of thee?
\nUnheeded then will pass the Angel throngs;
\nI shall not hear the Seraph’s burning songs,
\nAnd heaven itself will be all dark to me.
\nOh give me rather that drear, hopeless faith,
\nThat sees no morn beyond the night of death!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A FAREWELL TO OLE BULL.<\/p>\n

There was a fountain in my heart
\nWhose deeps had not been stirred;
\nA thirst for music in my soul
\nMy ear had never heard; —<\/p>\n

A feeling of the incomplete
\nTo all bright things allied;
\nA sense of something beautiful,
\nUnfilled, unsatisfied.<\/p>\n

But, waked beneath thy master-hand,
\nThose trembling chords have given
\nA foretaste of that deep, full life
\nThat I shall know in Heaven.<\/p>\n

In that resistless spell, for once,
\nThe vulture of Unrest,
\nThat whets its beak upon my heart,
\nLies, charmed, within my breast.<\/p>\n

Pale Memory and flushed Hope forget;
\nAmbition sinks to sleep;
\nAnd o’er my spirit falls a bliss
\nSo perfect that I weep.<\/p>\n

Oh, Stranger! though thy Farewell notes
\nNow on the breeze may sigh,
\nYet, treasured in our thrilling hearts,
\nTheir echo shall not die.<\/p>\n

Thou’st brought us from thy Northern home
\nOld Norway’s forest tones,
\nWild melodies from ancient lands,
\nOf palaces and thrones.<\/p>\n

Take back the “Prairie’s Solitude,”
\nThe voice of that dry sea,
\nWhose billowy breast is dyed with flowers,
\nMade audible by thee.<\/p>\n

Take back with thee what ne’er before
\nTo Music’s voice was given,
\nThe anthem that “Niagara” chaunts
\nUnceasingly to Heaven; —<\/p>\n

The spirit of a People waked
\nBy Freedom’s battle cry;
\nThe “Memory of their Washington,”
\nTheir song of victory.<\/p>\n

Take back with thee a loftier Fame,
\nA prouder niche in Art,
\nFresh laurels from our virgin soil,
\nAnd — take a Nation’s heart!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO A POET, PAINTER AND MUSICIAN.<\/p>\n

Three Muses one day
\nHad a serious fray,
\nConcerning a youth who had wandered astray,
\nAnd fast up Parnassus was taking his way.
\nThey each urged a claim
\nEach gave him her name,
\nAnd each vowed to crown him with chaplets of fame.
\nFrown followed retort,
\nTill to cut it all short,
\nThey decided to carry the case up to court.
\nAppllo averred,
\nThat from all he had heard,
\nThe claim of exclusiveness seemed quite absurd;
\nAnd he gave his decree
\nThat this soul should be free
\nFor the “joint occupancy” of the whole three.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nTHE BEE<\/p>\n

The honey-bee that wanders all day long,
\nThe field, the woodland, and the garden o’er,
\nTo gather in his fragrant winter store,
\nHumming in calm content his quiet song,
\nSeeks not alone the rose’s glowing breast,
\nThe lily’s dainty cup, the violet’s lips, —
\nBut from all rank and noxious weeds he sips
\nThe single drop of sweetness closely press\u00e9d
\nWithin the poison chalice. Thus, if we
\nSeek only to draw forth the hidden sweet,
\nIn all the varied human flowers we meet,
\nIn the wide garden of humanity,
\nAnd like the bee, if home the spoil we bear,
\nHived in our hearts it turns to nectar there.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LINES.<\/p>\n

Sing me that song again,
\nThat wild, impassioned lay;
\nThe tumult of my throbbing brain
\nThy voice shall charm away.<\/p>\n

Pour that harmonious flood
\nUpon my thirsting ear;
\n‘Twill cool the fever of my blood
\nThose silvery notes to hear.<\/p>\n

Sing me that mournful song,
\nThat song of love and woe,
\nThat these full fountains, closed so long,
\nOnce more may overflow.<\/p>\n

And while those gentle strings
\nThy fairy hand sweeps o’er,
\nUpon thy music’s trembling wings
\nMy fainting soul shall soar.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LINES
\nON READING SOME VERSES ENTITLED “A FAREWELL TO LOVE.”<\/p>\n

Oh, stern indeed must be that minstrel’s heart,
\nIn the world’s dusty highway doomed to move,
\nWho with life’s sunshine and its flowers can part,
\nWho strikes his harp, and sings, Farewell to Love!<\/p>\n

To Love! that beam that colors all our light,
\nAs the red rays illume the light of day;
\nWhose rose-hue, once extinguished from the sight,
\nLeaves the life-landscape of a dull, cold gray.<\/p>\n

To Love! the ethereal, the Promethean spirit,
\nThat bids this dust with life divine be moved;
\nThe only memory that we still inherit
\nOf the lost Eden where our parents roved.<\/p>\n

Oh, hopeless bard, recall that farewell strain,
\nNor from thy beast let this fond faith depart;
\nRecall that utterance of thy cold disdain,
\nThy doubt of Love, the atheism of the heart.<\/p>\n

And on the altar reared within thy soul,
\nLet the rekindled flame again aspire
\nAnd guard it round by all things beautiful,
\nAs vestal forms watched o’er the sacred fire; —<\/p>\n

That fire that once extinguished on the shrine,
\nGave fearful sign of coming woe to Rome,
\nAs the quenched brightness of this light divine
\nForebodes to thee a dark and loveless doom.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE WASTED FOUNTAINS.<\/p>\n

“And their nobles have sent their little ones to the waters;
\nthey came to the pits and found no water; they returned with
\ntheir vessels empty.” — Jeremiah<\/em>\u00a0xiv. 3.<\/p>\n

When the fitful fever of the soul
\nIs awakened in thee first;
\nAnd thou goest like Judah’s children forth,
\nTo slake thy burning thirst; —<\/p>\n

And when dry and wasted, like the springs
\nSought by that little band,
\nBefore thee, in their emptiness
\nLife’s broken cisterns stand; —<\/p>\n

When the ripened fruits that tempted,
\nTurn to ashes on the taste;
\nAnd thine early visions fade and pass,
\nLike the mirage of the waste; —<\/p>\n

When faith darkens, and hopes languish,
\nIn the shade of gathering years;
\nAnd the urn thou bear’st is empty,
\nOr o’erflowing with thy tears,<\/p>\n

Because those transient springs have failed thee,
\nAnd those founts of youth are dried;
\nWilt thou, among the mouldering stones,
\nIn weariness abide?<\/p>\n

Wilt thou sit among the ruins,
\nWith all words of cheer unspoken,
\nTill the silver chord is loosened;
\nTill the golden bowl is broken?<\/p>\n

Up, and onward! towards the east,
\nGreen oases thou shalt find;
\nStreams that rise from higher sources,
\nThan the pools thou leav’st behind.<\/p>\n

Life has import more inspiring
\nThan the fancies of thy youth;
\nIt has hopes as high as heaven;
\nIt has labor, — it has truth.<\/p>\n

It has wrongs that may be righted, —
\nNoble deeds that may be done; —
\nIts great battles are unfought,
\nIts great triumphs are unwon.<\/p>\n

There is rising from its troubled deeps,
\nA low, unceasing moan;
\nThere are arching, there are breaking
\nOther hearts besides thine own.<\/p>\n

From strong limbs, that should be chainless,
\nThere are fetters to unbind;
\nThere are words to raise the fallen;
\nThere is sight to give the blind.<\/p>\n

There are crushed and broken spirits,
\nThat electric thoughts may thrill;
\nLofty dreams to be embodied,
\nBy the might of one strong will.<\/p>\n

There are God and Truth above thee, —
\nWilt thou languish in despair?
\nTread thy griefs beneath thy feet, —
\nScale the walls of Heaven by prayer.<\/p>\n

‘Tis the key of the Apostle,
\nThat opens Heaven from below;
\n‘Tis the ladder of the patriarch,
\nWhereon angels come and go.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

CHRIST BETRAYED.<\/p>\n

Eighteen hundred years agone
\nWas that deed of darkness done —
\nWas that sacred, thorn-crowned head
\nTo a shameful death betrayed,
\nAnd Iscariot’s traitor name
\nBlazoned in eternal shame.
\nThou, disciple of our time,
\nFollower of the faith sublime,
\nWho with high and holy scorn
\nOf that traitrous deed dost burn,
\nThough the years may never more
\nTo our earth that form restore
\nThe Christ-Spirit ever lives —
\nEver in thy heart he strives.
\nWhen pale Misery mutely calls;
\nWhen thy tempted brother falls;
\nWhen thy gentle words may chain
\nHate, and Anger, and Disdain,
\nOr thy loving smile impart
\nCourage to some sinking heart;
\nWhen within thy troubled breast
\nGood and evil thoughts contest;
\nThough unconscious thou may’st be,
\nThe Christ-Spirit strives with thee.
\nWhen he trod the Holy Land,
\nWith his small disciple band,
\nAnd the fated hour had come
\nFor that august martyrdom —
\nWhen the man, the human love,
\nAnd the God within him strove —
\nAs in Gethsemane he wept,
\nThey, the faithless watchers, slept:
\nWhile for them he wept and prayed,
\nOne denied and one betrayed!
\nIf to-day thou turn’st aside
\nIn thy luxury and pride,
\nWrapped within thyself and blind
\nTo the sorrows of thy kind,
\nThou a faithless watch dost keep —
\nThou art one of those who sleep:
\nOr, if waking thou dost see
\nNothing of Divinity
\nIn our fallen, struggling race;
\nIf in them thou seest no trace
\nOf a glory dimmed, not gone,
\nOf a Future to be won —
\nOf a Future, hopeful, high —
\nThou, like Peter, dost deny:
\nBut if, seeing, thou believest,
\nIf the Evangel thou receivest,
\nYet, if thou art bound to Sin,
\nFalse to the Ideal within,
\nSlave of Ease or slave of Gold,
\nThou the Son of God hast sold!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.<\/p>\n

Oh thou who once on earth, beneath the weight
\nOf our mortality didst live and move,
\nThe incarnation of profoundest love;
\nWho on the Cross that love didst consummate;
\nWhose deep and ample fullness could embrace
\nThe poorest, meanest of our fallen race:
\nHow shall we e’er that boundless debt repay?
\nBy long loud prayers in gorgeous temples said?
\nBy rich oblations on thine altars laid?
\nAh, no! not thus thou didst appoint the way:
\nWhen thou wast bowed our human woe beneath,
\nThen as a legacy thou didst bequeath
\nEarth’s sorrowing children to our ministry —
\nAnd as we do to them, we do to thee.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

HAGAR.<\/p>\n

Untrodden, drear, and lone,
\nStretched many a league away,
\nBeneath a burning, noonday sun,
\nThe Syrian desert lay.<\/p>\n

The scorching rays that beat
\nUpon that herbless plain,
\nThe dazzling sands, with fiercer heat,
\nReflected back again.<\/p>\n

O’er that dry ocean strayed
\nNo wandering breath of air,
\nNo palm trees cast their cooling shade,
\nNo water murmured there.<\/p>\n

And thither, bowed with shame,
\nSpurned from her master’s side,
\nThe dark-browed child of Egypt came,
\nHer woe and shame to hide.<\/p>\n

Drooping, and travel-worn,
\nThe boy upon her hung;
\nWho, from his father’s tent, that morn,
\nLike a gazelle had sprung.<\/p>\n

His ebbing breath failed fast,
\nGlazed was his flashing eye;
\nAnd in that fearful, desert waste,
\nShe laid him down to die.<\/p>\n

But when, in wild despair,
\nShe left him to his lot,
\nA voice that filled that breathless air,
\nSaid, “Hagar, fear thou not.”<\/p>\n

Then o’er the hot sands flowed
\nA cooling, crystal stream,
\nAnd angels left their high abode,
\nAnd ministered to them.<\/p>\n

Oft, when drear wastes surround
\nMy faltering footsteps here,
\nI’ve thought, I too heard that blest sound
\nOf “Wanderer, do not fear.”<\/p>\n

And then, to light my path
\nOn through the evil land,
\nHave the twin angels, Hope and Faith,
\nWalked with me, hand to hand.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nLOVE.<\/p>\n

Go forth in life, oh friend! not seeking love;
\nA mendicant, that with imploring eye
\nAnd outstretched hand asks of the passers by
\nThe alms his strong necessities may move.
\nFor such poor love to pity near allied,
\nThy generous spirit may not stoop and wait,
\nA suppliant, whose prayer may be denied,
\nLike a spurned beggar’s at a palace gate:
\nBut thy heart’s affluence lavish uncontrolled;
\nThe largess of thy love give full and free,
\nAs monarchs in their progress scatter gold;
\nAnd be thy heart like the exhaustless sea,
\nThat must its wealth of cloud and dew bestow,
\nThough tributary streams or ebb or flow.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE IDEAL.<\/p>\n

“How the shadow the Ideal throws before it
\ndarkens the actual.” — Zanoni<\/em><\/p>\n

“La vie est un sommeil, l’amour en est le r\u00eave;.”<\/p>\n

A sad, sweet dream; it fell upon my soul
\nWhen song and thought first woke their echoes there,
\nSwaying my spirit to its wild control,
\nAnd with the shadow of a fond despair
\nDarkening the fountain of my young life’s stream —
\nIt haunts me still, and yet I know ’tis but a dream.<\/p>\n

Whence art thou, shadowy presence, that canst hide
\nFrom my charmed sight the glorious things of earth?
\nA mirage o’er life’s desert dost thou glide?
\nOr, with those glimmerings of a former birth,
\nA “trailing cloud of glory,” hast thou come
\nFrom some bright world afar, our unremembered home?<\/p>\n

I know thou dwell’st not in this dull cold Real,
\nI know thy home is in some brighter sphere;
\nI know I shall not meet thee, my Ideal!
\nIn the dark wanderings that await me here —
\nWhy comes thy gentle image then to me,
\nWasting my night of life in one long dream of thee!<\/p>\n

The city’s peopled solitude, the glare
\nOf festal halls, moonlight and music’s tone,
\nAll breathe the sad refrain thou art not there<\/em>;
\nAnd even with Nature, I am still alone;
\nWith joy I watch her summer bloom depart —
\nI love drear winter’s reign — ’tis winter in my heart.<\/p>\n

And if I sigh upon my brow to see
\nThe deepening shadow of Time’s fleeting wing,
\n‘Tis for the youth I might not give to thee, —
\nThe vanished brightness of my first sweet spring;
\nThat I might give thee not the joyous form,
\nUnsworn by bitter tears, unblighted by the storm.<\/p>\n

And when the hearts I should be proud to win,
\nBreathe, in those tones that woman holds so dear,
\nWords of impassioned homage unto mine,
\nColdly and harsh they fall upon my ear;
\nAnd as I listen to the fervent vow,
\nMy weary heart replies, “Alas! it is not thou!<\/em>”<\/p>\n

And when the thoughts within my spirit glow,
\nThat would outpour themselves in words of fire,
\nIf some kind influence bade the music flow,
\nLike that which woke the notes of Memnon’s lyre;
\nThou, sunlight of my life! wakest not the lay —
\nAnd song within my heart unuttered dies away.<\/p>\n

Depart, oh shadow! fatal dream, depart!
\nGo, I conjure thee; leave me this poor life,
\nAnd I will meet with firm, heroic heart,
\nIts threatening storms and its tumultuous strife,
\nAnd with the Poet-Seer will see thee stand,
\nTo welcome my approach to thine own Spirit-land.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE IDEAL FOUND.<\/p>\n

I’ve met thee, whom I dared not hope to meet,
\nSave in the enchanted land of my day-dreams:
\nYes, in this common world, this waking state,
\nThy living presence on my vision beams —
\nLife’s dream embodied in reality,
\nAnd in thine eyes I read indifference to me!<\/p>\n

Yes, in those star-like eyes I read my fate,
\nMy horoscope is written in their gaze;
\nMy “house of life,” henceforth is desolate:
\nBut the dark aspect my firm heart surveys,
\nNor faints, nor falters even for thy sake:
\n‘Tis calm, and nerved, and strong: no, no, it shall not break!<\/p>\n

For I am of that mood that will defy —
\nThat does not cower before the gathering storm;
\nThat face to face will meet its destiny,
\nAnd undismayed confront its darkest form.
\nWild energies awaken in this strife,
\nThis conflict of the soul with the grim phantom Life.<\/p>\n

But ah! if thou hadst loved me — had I been
\nAll to thy dreams that to mine own thou art —
\nHad those dark eyes beamed eloquent on mine,
\nPressed for one moment to that noble heart,
\nIn the full consciousness of faith unspoken,
\nLife could have given no more — then had my proud heart broken!<\/p>\n

The Alpine glacier from its height may mock
\nThe clouds and lightnings of the winter sky,
\nAnd from the tempest and the thunder’s shock,
\nGather new strength to lift its summit high;
\nBut kissed by sunbeams of the summer day,
\nIt bows its icy crest and weeps itself away.<\/p>\n

Thou know’st the fable of the Grecian mind,
\nWooed by the veiled immortal from the skies, —
\nHow, in his full perfection, once she prayed,
\nThat he would stand before her longing eyes;
\nAnd how that brightness, too intense to bless,
\nConsumed her o’erwrought heart with its divine excess.<\/p>\n

To me there is a meaning in the tale.
\nI have not prayed to meet thee: I can brook
\nThat thou should’st wear to me that icy veil;
\nI can give back thy cold and careless look:
\nYet, shrined within my heart, still thou shalt seem,
\nWhat there thou ever wert, a beautiful, bright dream!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

IMAGE WORSHIP.<\/p>\n

Why mounts my blood to cheek and brow,
\nLike an ascending flame,
\nWhene’er from careless lips I hear
\nThe accents of thy name?<\/p>\n

Why, when my idle fancy seeks
\nSome pictured form to trace,
\nBeneath my pencil still will grow
\nThe features of thy face?<\/p>\n

Why comes thy haunting shadow thus
\nBetween the world and me,
\nTo bind my spirit with a charm
\nThat blinds to all but thee?<\/p>\n

To bid me watch thine upward course,
\nThy path from mine so far;
\nAs earth, ‘mid all the hosts of heaven,
\nWatches the polar star?<\/p>\n

Thy cold and polished courtesy,
\nEach look and tone of thine,
\nMight well have roused the woman’s pride
\nIn duller souls than mine.<\/p>\n

They tell me, too, thy heart is light, —
\nThat more than once thou’st loved;
\nAnd ‘mid all flowers of loveliness
\nThat bee-like thou hast roved.<\/p>\n

Why is it, then, while o’er thy heart
\nThere comes no thought of me,
\nThe good, the true, the beautiful,
\nAll speak to me of thee?<\/p>\n

Think’st thou ’tis what the world calls love,
\nLove that return is seeking?
\nNo — I would scorn a love I sought,
\nAlthough my heart were breaking.<\/p>\n

It is because within the human heart
\nThere is an altar to an Unknown God<\/em>,
\nWho from the gods of this world dwells apart,
\nAnd in the Unseen, the Unreal, has his abode.<\/p>\n

This disembodied thought the soul pursues,
\nAnd seeking in the visible a sign,
\nShe moulds an image, like the apostate Jews,
\nAnd sets her idol on the vacant shrine.<\/p>\n

Thus worshipped once an Indian maid the sun;
\nThus was an Arab boy won by a star;
\nThus loved a maid of France the god in stone;
\nAnd thus did Numa love a shape of air.<\/p>\n

What were the sun, the star, the god, to them,
\nThe fond idolators! thou art to me;
\nAnd rapturous as a poet’s earliest dream,
\nIs the sweet worship that I give to thee.<\/p>\n

The world around me is so dark and cold,
\nLife hath for me such draughts of bitter sadness,
\nOh, bid me not the mocking Real behold!
\nOh, wake me not from this delicious madness!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE IMAGE BROKEN.<\/p>\n

‘Twas but a dream; a fond and foolish dream;
\nThe calenture of a delirious brain,
\nWhose fever thirst creates the rushing stream.
\nNow to the actual I awake again:
\nThe vision to my gaze one moment granted,
\nFades in its light away, and leaves me disenchanted.<\/p>\n

The image that my glowing fancy wrought,
\nNow to the dust with ruthless hand I cast:
\nThus I renounce the worship that I sought;
\nOf my own idol the iconoclast.
\nThe echo of “Eureka, I have found!”
\nFalls back upon my heart, a vain and empty sound.<\/p>\n

Oh disembodied being of my mind,
\nSo wildly loved, so fervently adored;
\nIn whom all high and glorious gifts I shrined,
\nAnd my heart’s incense on the altar poured;
\nNow do I know, that clad in mortal guise,
\nNe’er on this earth wilt thou upon my vision rise.<\/p>\n

That only in the vague, cold realm of thought,
\nShall I meet thee whom here I seek in vain;
\nAnd like Egyptian Isis, when she sought
\nThe scattered fragments of Osiris slain,
\nNow do I know that I shall never find
\nBut fragments of thy soul within earth’s clay enshrined.<\/p>\n

Thou whom I have not seen, and shall not see,
\nTill the sad drama of this life be o’er!
\nYet do I not renounce my faith in thee:
\nThou art still mine, I think, forevermore;
\nAnd this belief shall be the funeral pyre
\nOf all less noble love, — of all less high desire.<\/p>\n

Here, like the Hindoo widow, I will bring
\nHope, youth, and all that woman prizes most,
\nThe glow of summer and the bloom of spring,
\nAnd on thy altar lay the holocaust;
\nAnd in my faith exulting, I will see
\nThe sacrifice consume, I consecrate to thee.<\/p>\n

To love’s sweet tones my heart shall never thrill,
\nNor, as the tardy years their circles roll,
\nShall they the ardor of its pulses chill.
\nThus will I live, in widowhood of soul,
\nUntil, at last, my lingering exile o’er,
\nUpon some lovelier star, too bless\u00e9d, we meet once more.<\/p>\n

Oh, tell me not, that now indeed I dream;
\nThat these aspirings mocked at last will be: —
\nGleams of a higher life, to me they seem
\nA sacred pledge of immortality.
\nTell not the yearning heart it shall not find:
\nOh Love, thou art too strong! Oh God, thou art too kind!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

Within these leafless trees,
\nThat bare against the sky,
\nTheir naked branches rear;
\nLeaves, buds, and blossoms lie.<\/p>\n

So beauty’s myriad forms,
\nWithin thy soul are sleeping;
\nWhile thou, upon their sleep,
\nA wintry spell art keeping.<\/p>\n

But soon the leaves and flowers
\nShall burst their living tomb,
\nAnd fill the air around
\nWith perfume and with bloom.<\/p>\n

And buried in thy heart,
\nShall thought’s fair blossoms lie,
\nForever unrevealed,
\nTo wither and to die?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nTHE SUN AND STREAM.<\/p>\n

As some dark stream within a cavern’s breast,
\nFlows murmuring, moaning for the distant sun,
\nSo ere I met thee, murmuring its unrest,
\nDid my life’s current coldly, darkly run.
\nAnd as that stream, beneath the sun’s full gaze,
\nIts separate course and life no more maintains,
\nBut now absorbed, transfused far o’er the plains,
\nIt floats, etherealized in those warm rays;
\nSo in the sunlight of thy fervid love,
\nMy heart, so long to earth’s dark channels given,
\nNow soars, all pain, all doubt, all ill above,
\nAnd breathes the ether of the upper heaven:
\nSo thy high spirit holds and governs mine;
\nSo is my life, my being, lost in thine!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON SEEING MRS. KEAN AS CONSTANCE IN KING JOHN.<\/p>\n

‘Twas no illusion; from the Past the veil was rent away;
\nThe tide that never changes ebbed, and bore me to that day,
\nWhen in the lists and on the field brave deeds of arms were done,
\nWhen England blushed beneath the rule of recreant King John.<\/p>\n

Scenes from that dim and buried Past came thronging on the gaze,
\nIn all the splendid pageantry of those heroic days.
\nThere Angiers’ towers and battlements in stately grandeur frowned
\nUpon the engines of grim war grouped threat’ningly around:<\/p>\n

And where the gathering warlike ranks in burnished armor gleamed,
\nThe sacred Oriflamme of France, the Red Cross Banner streamed:
\nThere Templars came with cross and sword, vowed to the Holy Land,
\nThere were the fiery feudal lords, each with his vassal band:<\/p>\n

And in his scarlet robes arrayed, the haughty legate strode,
\nAs when above the prostrate King, in ancient days he trode.
\nForgetful, for the hour I lived in that chivalric age,
\nAmid the stirring scenes portrayed on History’s varied page.<\/p>\n

But when the gentle Constance came and bowed her queenly head
\nTo that wild tempest of the soul, that grief profound and dread,
\nThe pageant vanished from my sight, I only heard her words,
\nI only felt the woe that thrilled the heart’s electric chords.<\/p>\n

Years bring decay and change and death to kingdom and to clime,
\nBut human sympathy and love are changeless through all time:
\nIn the eternal Now they live, though centuries o’er them roll;
\nThey bloom forever fresh and young, immortal as the soul.<\/p>\n

Thou, on whose brow the coronet of injured Constance shone,
\nWho to the glittering circlet gav’st a lustre not its own, —
\nThou canst recall those lovely forms the faded Past inurns;
\nThou summonest, and the shapeless dust to life and youth returns.<\/p>\n

Thou hast the spell, the magic power, the heart’s deep founts to move,
\nTo wake the latent ecstasies of Hope, Despair and Love, —
\nAnd many a poet’s loveliest dream now bears thy form and face,
\nSpeaks in thy sweet impassioned voice, and wears thy matchless grace.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE WOUNDED VULTURE.<\/p>\n

A kingly vulture sat alone,
\nLord of the ruin round,
\nWhere Egypt’s ancient monuments
\nUpon the desert frowned.<\/p>\n

A hunter’s eager eye had marked
\nThe form of that proud bird,
\nAnd through the voiceless solitude
\nHis ringing shot was heard.<\/p>\n

It rent that vulture’s plum\u00e9d breast,
\nAimed with unerring hand,
\nAnd his life-blood gushed warm and red
\nUpon the yellow sand.<\/p>\n

No struggle marked the deadly wound,
\nHe gave no piercing cry,
\nBut calmly spread his giant wings,
\nAnd sought the upper sky.<\/p>\n

In vain with swift pursuing shot
\nThe hunter seeks his prey,
\nCircling and circling upward still
\nOn his majestic way.<\/p>\n

Up to the blue empyrean
\nHe wings his steady flight,
\nTill his receding form is lost
\nIn the full flood of light.<\/p>\n

Oh wounded heart! oh suffering soul!
\nSit not with folded wing,
\nWhere broken dreams and ruined hopes
\nTheir mournful shadows fling.<\/p>\n

Outspread thy pinions like that bird,
\nTake thou the path sublime,
\nBeyond the flying shafts of Fate,
\nBeyond the wounds of Time.<\/p>\n

Mount upward! brave the clouds and storms!
\nAbove life’s desert plain
\nThere is a calmer, purer air,
\nA heaven thou, too, may’st gain.<\/p>\n

And as that dim, ascending form
\nWas lost in day’s broad light,
\nSo shall thine earthly sorrows fade,
\nLost in the Infinite.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nTO ________.<\/p>\n

Ah no! my love knows no vain jealousy:
\nThe rose that blooms and lives but in the sun,
\nAsks not what other flowers he shines upon,
\nIf he but shine on her. Enough for me,
\nThus in thy light to dwell, and thus to share
\nThe sunshine of thy smile with all things fair.
\nI know thou’rt vowed to Beauty, not to Love.
\nI would not stay thy footsteps from one shrine,
\nNor would I bind thee by a sigh to mine.
\nFor me — I have no lingering wish to rove;
\nFor though I worship all things fair, like thee,
\nOf outward grace, of soul-nobility;
\nHappier than thou, I find them all in one,
\nAnd I would worship at thy shrine alone!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

MEMORY.<\/p>\n

Maiden of the lofty brow,
\nMournful eye and cheek of snow;
\nThou whose gaze is ever cast
\nOn the pageant of the Past;
\nTell me what thou seest there;
\nTell me what its voices bear.<\/p>\n

“Wheresoe’er I turn mine eyes,
\nGorgeous visions on them rise.
\nIn the distance, dim and far,
\nI see the glorious pomp of war:
\nGrecian phalanx, Persian host,
\nDarken now yon rocky coast;
\nNow the youth of Macedon,
\nHalf the trembling earth has won;
\nNow o’er barbaric hordes and kings,
\nThe Roman eagle flaps his wings.
\nWhere the Crusaders’ ranks advance,
\nI see their burnished armor glance;
\nAnd turban\u00e9d Turk, in eastern garb,
\nSpur to the charge his fiery barb.
\nKings and nobles I behold;
\nSteel-clad knights and barons bold;
\nSlaves and serfs, a countless band,
\nThrong the misty, phantom-land.<\/p>\n

“Through cathedrals, old and dim,
\nEcho anthem, prayer, and hymn;
\nAnd holy priests, in flowing stoles,
\nChaunt masses for departed souls.
\nI see the breathing forms of Art,
\nFrom the Grecian marble start;
\nImmortal pictures live and glow,
\nFrom Raphael and Angelo.
\nAnd voices, like the rushing blast,
\nSwell through this temple of the past:
\nHomer strikes his thrilling strings,
\nAnd to the listening ages sings;
\nShakspeare’s voice joins in the chime,
\nEchoing through the vaults of Time;
\nWith the two to whom ’tis given
\nTo lift the veil that curtains Heaven.
\nAnd while these changing shades appear,
\nAnd while these voices green mine ear,
\nStill, with vision backward cast,
\nI must mourn the vanished past.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

HOPE.<\/p>\n

Maiden! in whose kindling eye,
\nBurns the fire of prophecy,
\nOn whose brow its glories shine,
\nPriestess at the hidden shrine;
\nTell me what fair visions rise,
\nAs the future greets thine eyes.
\nThither where thou still dost turn,
\nDoes a bright Shekinah burn?
\nDoes thy outstretched, beckoning hand,
\nPoint us to a promised land,
\nWhere the rage of War no more
\nShall drench the crimsoned earth with gore?
\nWhere no more, with features gaunt,
\nShall stalk the haggard form of Want,
\nNor Misery’s wail, nor Famine’s cries
\nUpon the ear of Plenty rise,
\nWhen the voice of Liberty
\nShall bid the earth’s oppressed go free?
\nThou, on whom the Future beams,
\nTell me, are these idle dreams?<\/p>\n

“As the messenger went forth,
\nSeeking o’er the deluged earth,
\nSo, my gaze hath wandered wide,
\nO’er the Future’s troubled tide.
\nAs across the waters dark,
\nThe bird returned to that lone bark,
\nWith the leaf of olive tree,
\nSo return I unto thee.
\nNot yet do wind and wave subside;
\nNot yet do land and sea divide;
\nNo verdant earth the vision cheers,
\nNo peak of Ararat appears;
\nBut spanning all that troubled sky,
\nThe Bow of Promise shines on high.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

I do not ask if an illustrious name
\nHas shed upon thy birth its purple glow;
\nNor do I ask what titles thou canst claim,
\nWhat ribbon favors, such as kings bestow.<\/p>\n

Why should I, when upon thy brow I see,
\nIn its expression of all lofty things,
\nThe insignia of that true nobility
\nThat bears the impress of the King of kings?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________, IN OBSCURITY.<\/p>\n

In full-orbed splendor now the queen of Night,
\nAmong the stars walks in her pride of place,
\nAnd how again we miss that flood of light
\nThat overflowed the azure fields of space.<\/p>\n

But though her brightness meets no more the gaze,
\nAs in her wonted orbit she declines,
\nYet not extinguished are her silver rays, —
\nShe shines in shadow, but not less she shines.<\/p>\n

Soon will she rise again upon the sight,
\nPassing the darkened shape that bids her wane;
\nThen shall we see her, in unclouded light,
\nTake her own place among the stars again.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE DYING SYCAMORES.<\/p>\n

A beauty like young womanhood’s
\nUpon the green earth lies,
\nAnd June’s sweet smile hath waked again
\nAll summer’s harmonies.<\/p>\n

The insects hum their dreamy song,
\nThe trees their honors wear,
\nAnd languid with its perfume spoils
\nSighs the voluptuous air.<\/p>\n

A gorgeous wealth of leaf and bloom
\nEnchants the dazzled sight;
\nAnd over earth and sky there smiles
\nA Presence of delight.<\/p>\n

From yon sad dying Sycamores,
\nAlone a shadow falls, —
\nAs from the ghastly form of Death,
\nIn Egypt’s banquet-halls.<\/p>\n

Against the soft blue sky they stand,
\nTheir naked limbs outspread,
\nAnd to the throbbing life around,
\nThey murmur of the dead.<\/p>\n

Spring, with her soft and odorous breath,
\nHath sighed o’er them in vain,
\nNor sun, nor dew, nor summer shower,
\nAwakes their bloom again.<\/p>\n

Oh stately monarchs of the wood,
\nWhat blight hath o’er ye passed?
\nWhat kanker wastes your noble hearts?
\nWhat spell is on ye cast?<\/p>\n

I watch ye where a thousand forms
\nWith life and beauty glow,
\nTill half I deem that on ye lies
\nSome weight of human woe.<\/p>\n

Sad emblems are ye of those hearts
\nIn this fair world of ours,
\nWho live unloving and unloved,
\nOh dying Sycamores.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LINES
\nON AN INCIDENT OBSERVED FROM THE DECK
\nOF A STEAMBOAT ON THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER.<\/p>\n

Where the dark primeval forests
\nRise against the western sky
\nAnd “the Father of the Waters”
\nIn his strength goes rushing by:<\/p>\n

There an eagle, flying earthward
\nFrom his eyrie far above,
\nWith a serpent of the forest
\nIn a fierce encounter strove.<\/p>\n

Now he gains and now he loses,
\nNow he frees his ruffled wings;
\nAnd now high in air he rises;
\nBut the serpent round him clings.<\/p>\n

In that death embrace entwining,
\nNow they sink and now they rise;
\nBut the serpent wins the battle
\nWith the monarch of the skies.<\/p>\n

Yet his wings still struggle upward,
\nThough that crushing weight they bear;
\nBut more feebly those broad pinions
\nStrike the waves of upper air.<\/p>\n

Down to earth he sinks a captive
\nIn that writhing, living chain;
\nNever o’er the blue horizon
\nWill his proud form sweep again.<\/p>\n

Never more in lightning flashes
\nWill his eye of terror gleam
\nRound the high and rocky eyrie,
\nWhere his lonely eaglets scream.<\/p>\n

Oh majestic, royal eagle,
\nSoaring sunward from thy birth,
\nThou hast lost the realm of heaven
\nFor one moment on the earth!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

Give me but the energy,
\nThat guides thy dauntless will;
\nGive me but thy ardent hope,
\nThat no reverse can chill;<\/p>\n

Thy buoyant soul, that on life’s sea,
\nNo billows can o’erwhelm,
\nWhen Faith sits smiling through the clouds,
\nAnd Reason holds the helm;<\/p>\n

Give me these qualities of thine,
\nIn such a meet alliance,
\nAnd I, like thee, upon the fates
\nWill smile a calm defiance.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO AN ASTRONOMER.<\/p>\n

Upon the Professor we’ll waste not a glance,
\nSince he has no eyes for us poor terrestrials;
\nWith his heart can we have any possible chance,
\nWhen he gives us for rivals a host of celestials?
\nWhat cares he for eyes, whether hazel or blue,
\nOr for any slight charms such as we share between us, —
\nWhen, his glass in his hand, he can sit the night through,
\nAnd ogle at leisure Diana and Venus.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

This life is to thee like a region enchanted,
\nO’er which thy rich fancy its rose-color throws;
\nThe hours as they pass thee with visions are haunted,
\nAnd thou dream’st them away in inglorious repose.<\/p>\n

Around thee bold hearts the rude war are waging,
\nBut thou dreamest on still through the roar and the strife;
\nAround thee, oh sleeper! the conflict is raging,
\nAnd they need thy strong arm in the Battle of Life!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EROS.<\/p>\n

As when untaught and blind,
\nTo the mute stone the pagan bows his knee,
\nSpirit of Love! phantom of my own mind!
\nSo have I worshipped thee!<\/p>\n

When first a laughing child,
\nI gazed on nature with a wondering eye,
\nI learned of her in calm and tempest wild,
\nThis thirst for sympathy.<\/p>\n

I saw the flowers appear,
\nAnd spread their petals out to meet the sun,
\nThe dew-drops on their glistening leaves draw near
\nAnd mingle into one.<\/p>\n

And if a harp was stirred
\nBy the soft pulses of some wandering sound,
\nAttuned to the same key, then I have heard
\nIts chords untouched respond.<\/p>\n

Fast through the vaulted sky,
\nGiving no sound or light, when storms were loud,
\nI saw the electric cloud in silence fly, —
\nSeeking its sister cloud.<\/p>\n

I saw the winds, the sea,
\nAnd all the hosts of heaven in bright array,
\nGoverned by this sweet law of sympathy,
\nRoll on their destined way.<\/p>\n

And then my spirit pined,
\nAnd, like the sea-shell for its parent sea,
\nMoaned for those kindred souls it could not find,
\nAnd panted to be free.<\/p>\n

And then came wild despair,
\nAnd laid her palsying hand upon my soul,
\nAnd her dread ministers were with her there,
\nThe dagger and the bowl.<\/p>\n

Oh God of life and light,
\nThou who didst stay my hand in that dread hour,
\nThou who didst save me in that fearful night,
\nOf maddening passion’s power!<\/p>\n

Before thy throne I bow;
\nI tear my worshipped idols from their shrine;
\nI give to thee, though bruised and aching now,
\nThis heart, — oh! make it thine.<\/p>\n

I’ve sought to fill in vain
\nIts lonely, silent depths with human love:
\nHelp me to cast away each earthly claim
\nAnd rise to thee above.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BONES IN THE DESERT.<\/p>\n

Where pilgrims seek the Prophet’s tomb
\nAcross the Arabian waste,
\nUpon the ever-shifting sands,
\nA fearful path is traced.<\/p>\n

Far up to the horizon’s verge,
\nThe traveller sees it rise, —
\nThe line of ghastly bones that bleach
\nBeneath those burning skies.<\/p>\n

Across it, tempest and simoom
\nThe desert sands have strewed,
\nBut still that line of spectral white
\nForever is renewed.<\/p>\n

For while along that burning track,
\nThe caravans move on,
\nStill do the way-worn pilgrims fall,
\nEre yet the shrine be won.<\/p>\n

There the tired camel lays him down
\nAnd shuts his gentle eyes;
\nAnd there the fiery rider droops,
\nToward Mecca looks and dies.<\/p>\n

They fall unheeded from the ranks: —
\nOn sweeps the endless train,
\nBut there, to mark the desert path,
\nTheir whitening bones remain.<\/p>\n

And thus I read the mournful tale,
\nUpon the traveller’s page,
\nI thought how like the march of life
\nIs this sad pilgrimage.<\/p>\n

For every heart hath some fair dream,
\nSome object unattained,
\nAnd far off in the distance lies
\nSome Mecca to be gained.<\/p>\n

But beauty, manhood, love and power
\nGo in their morning down,
\nAnd longing eyes and outstretched arms,
\nTell of the goal unwon.<\/p>\n

The mighty caravan of life
\nAbove their dust may sweep,
\nNor shout, nor trampling feet shall break
\nThe rest of those who sleep.<\/p>\n

Oh! fountains that I have not reached,
\nThat gush far off e’en now,
\nWhen shall I quench my spirit’s thirst
\nWhere your sweet waters flow.<\/p>\n

Oh! Mecca of my life-long dreams,
\nCloud palaces that rise
\nIn that far distance, pierced by hope,
\nWhen will ye greet mine eyes.<\/p>\n

The shadows lengthen toward the East
\nFrom the declining sun,
\nAnd the pilgrim, as ye still recede,
\nSighs for the journey done.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nTHE LAKE AND STAR.<\/p>\n

The mountain lake, o’ershadowed by the hills,
\nMay still gaze heavenward on the evening star,
\nWhose distant light its dark recesses fills,
\nThough boundless distance must divide them far;
\nStill may the lake the star’s bright image bear,
\nStill may the star, from its blue ether dome,
\nShower down its silver beams across the gloom,
\nAnd light the wave that wanders darkly there.
\nStar of my life! thus do I turn to thee
\nAmid the shadows that above me roll;
\nThus from thy distant sphere thou shinest on me;
\nThus does thine image float upon my soul,
\nThrough the wide space that must our lives dissever
\nFar as the lake and star, ah me! forever.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO A SILENT POET.<\/p>\n

I see the sons of Genius rise
\nThe nobles of our land;
\nAnd foremost in the gathering ranks
\nI see the poet band.<\/p>\n

That Priesthood of the beautiful,
\nTo whom alone ’tis given
\nTo lift our spirits from the dust,
\nBack to their native heaven.<\/p>\n

But there is one amid the throng,
\nNot past his manhood’s prime;
\nThe laurel wreath upon his brow,
\nHas greener grown with time.<\/p>\n

And in his eye yet glows the light
\nOf the celestial fire;
\nBut cast beside him, on the earth,
\nIs his neglected lyre.<\/p>\n

The lyre, whose high, heroic notes
\nA thousand hearts have stirred,
\nLies mute, — the skillful hand no more
\nAwakes one slumbering chord.<\/p>\n

Oh poet! rouse thee from thy dreams!
\nWake from thy voiceless slumbers!
\nAnd once again give to the breeze
\nThe music of thy numbers.<\/p>\n

Sing, for our country claims her bard,
\nShe listens for thy strains;
\nSing, for upon our jarring earth,
\nToo much of discord reigns.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO THE VENERABLE GENERAL GAINES.<\/p>\n

Though Time has silvered o’er thy honored head,
\nAnd left some traces on thy gallant form,
\nUpon thy soul no hoar-frost has he shed,
\nNor chilled the heart that yet beats true and warm.<\/p>\n

And he, in whom the glow of early feeling,
\nYouth’s fire and ardor, are not dimmed and cold,
\nWho still life’s morning freshness is revealing, —
\nHowe’er Time’s record stands, can ne’er grow old.<\/p>\n

The fabled fountain of immortal youth,
\nThat Ponce de Leon sought with such unrest,
\nIn far-off southern isles, thou’st found in truth;
\nIts living waters gush within thy breast.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO MRS. KEAN.<\/p>\n

Of those fair characters the bards create,
\nRound which thy genius added charms has thrown,
\nOf those sweet natures thou dost personate,
\nThere is not one more lovely than thine own.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nA REMEMBRANCE.<\/p>\n

Night closes round me, and wild threatening forms
\nClasp me with icy arms and chain me down,
\nAnd bind upon my brow a cypress crown,
\nDewy with tears, and heaven frowns dark with storms;
\nBut the one glorious memory of thee
\nRises upon my path to guide and bless,
\nThe bright SHEKINAH of the wilderness,
\nThe Polar Star upon a trackless sea,
\nThe beaming Pharos of the unreached shore.
\nIt spans the clouds that gather o’er my way,
\nThe rainbow of my life’s tempestuous day.
\nOh, blessed thought! stay with me evermore,
\nAnd shed thy lustrous beams where midnight glooms,
\nAs fragrant lamps burned in the ancient tombs.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON A PICTURE OF RUTH.<\/p>\n

Fresh, through the mist of ages past,
\nThou risest on our view,
\nAs when from Judah’s waving fields,
\nThy footsteps brushed the dew.<\/p>\n

Yet ’tis not for thy beauty’s sake
\nWe thus remember thee;
\nAlthough a chieftain’s captive heart
\nAttests its potency; —<\/p>\n

Not for the quiet interest
\nThy simple story brings;
\nAnd not that from thy side there sprung
\nA line of prophet-kings.<\/p>\n

But for that changeless, deathless love,
\nThe true soul only knows,
\nThat still, as darker lowers the night,
\nSerener, brighter glows.<\/p>\n

That love that led thee forth to seek
\nThe stranger’s chill abode, —
\nUpon whose altar thou couldst lay
\nThy home, thy land, thy God.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nTARPEIA.<\/p>\n

“Give me the bracelets that your warriors wear,”
\nThe Roman traitress to the Sabine cried,
\n“Give me the toys, and I will be your guide,
\nAnd to your host the city’s gates unbar.”
\nThen to the walls each eager warrior rushed,
\nAnd on the base Tarpeia as he passed,
\nEach from his arm the massive circlet cast,
\nTill her slight form beneath the weight was crushed.
\nThus are our idle wishes. Thus we sigh
\nFor some imagined good yet unattained; —
\nFor wealth, or fame, or love, and which once gained
\nMay like a curse o’er all our future lie.
\nThus in our blindness do we ask of fate,
\nThe gifts that once bestowed may crush us with their weight.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON THE DEATH OF A FRIEND.<\/p>\n

There was no bell to peal thy funeral dirge,
\nNo nodding plumes to wave above thy bier,
\nNo shroud to wrap thee but the foaming surge,
\nNo kindly voices thy dark way to cheer,
\nNo eye to give the tribute of a tear.
\nAlone, “unknell\u00e9d, uncoffin\u00e9d,” thou hast died,
\nWithout one gentle mourner lingering near;
\nDown the deep waters thou unseen didst glide,
\nWith Ocean’s countless dead to slumber side by side.<\/p>\n

Thou sleep’st not with thy fathers. O’er thy bed,
\nThe flowers that deck their tombs may never wave;
\nTo plead remembrance for thee o’er thy head
\nNo sculptur\u00e9d marble shall arise. Thy grave
\nIs the dark boundless deep, whose waters lave
\nThe shores of empires. When thou sought’st thy rest
\nWithin their silent depths, they only gave
\nA circling ripple, then with foaming crest
\nThe booming waves roll\u00e9d over their unconscious guest.<\/p>\n

‘Tis said that far beneath the wild waves rushing,
\nWhere sea-flowers bloom and fabled Peris dwell,
\nThat there the restless waters cease their gushing,
\nAnd leave their dead within some sparkling cell,
\nWhere gems are gleaming, and the lone sea shell
\nIs breathing its sweet music. And ’tis said
\nThat Time, who weaveth over Earth a spell
\nOf blight and ruin, o’er the Ocean’s dead
\nHe passeth lightly on, with trackless, silent tread.<\/p>\n

Then, though no marble e’er shall rise for thee,
\nNo monument to mark thy last long home,
\nThine ocean grave unhonored shall not be, —
\nThe coral insect there shall rear a tomb
\nThat age shall ne’er destroy; and there shall bloom
\nThe fadeless ocean flowers. And though the glare
\nOf the bright sunbeams ne’er shall light its gloom,
\nYet glancing eyes and forms unearthly fair
\nShall throng around thy couch, and hymn a requiem there.<\/p>\n

Now fare thee well! I will not weep that thou
\nDidst pass so soon away; for though thou wert
\nStill in thy boyhood’s prime, and thy fair brow
\nUndimmed by age; yet sad was thy young heart,
\nFor thou hadst seen the light of life depart,
\nAnd Love had thrown his wild and burning spell
\nAround thee, and with deep, insidious art
\nHad maddened thee. Then sounded loud the knell
\nOf all thy bright young dreams. My earliest friend, farewell!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

In the noble army of Reform
\nThou art a pioneer;
\nAnd bravely wields thy good right arm,
\nThe broadsword and the spear.<\/p>\n

Thou may’st not see the battle’s close,
\nThe victory may’st not win:
\nBut the scars upon thy spirit prove,
\nThou has not lived in vain.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON A PICTURE.<\/p>\n

Why bends she o’er that glittering toy
\nWith such an earnest gaze,
\nAs if those flashing jewels cast
\nLove glances in their rays?<\/p>\n

By that high, thought-enthron\u00e9d brow —
\nThat deep and soul-lit eye,
\nI know ’tis not the passing dream
\nOf woman’s vanity.<\/p>\n

I know that in its golden links
\nSome talisman is set,
\nAnd for the heart it rests upon,
\n‘Tis Love’s own amulet.<\/p>\n

Oh, may that heart, so joyous now,
\nNo heavier burden bear;
\nThe beauty of that noble brow,
\nNo deeper shadow wear.<\/p>\n

Alas! how vain the wish, for souls
\nThat wildest rapture know,
\nMust vibrate with a keener pang,
\nTo every note of woe.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE MEDITERRANEAN.
\n[A SCHOOL COMPOSITION.]<\/p>\n

Hail! thou eternal flood, whose restless waves
\nRoll onward in their course, as wild and free,
\nAs if the shores they lashed were not the graves
\nOf mouldering empires; When I think of thee,
\nThou dost remind me of that ebbless sea —
\nThe sea of Time, whose tide sweeps unconfined,
\nIts channel Earth, its shores Eternity;
\nWhose billows roll resistless o’er mankind; —
\nLike that thou rollest on, nor heed’st the wrecks behind.<\/p>\n

Thy shores were empires; but the tide of Time
\nRolled o’er them, and they fell; and there they lie,
\nWrecked in their greatness, mouldering, yet sublime
\nAnd beautiful in their mortality.
\nAnd god-like men were there, the wise and free;
\nBut what are they who now look o’er thy waves?
\nThey’re but as worms that feed on their decay;
\nThey kneel to stranger lords — a land of slaves,
\nOf men whose only boast is their ancestral graves.<\/p>\n

Upon thy shores the Holy Prophets trod,
\nAnd from their hill-tops came the voice of One
\nWhom thou<\/em>\u00a0obeyest, even the Eternal God;
\nAnd on thy breast the star of Bethlehem shone:
\nThat star, though quenched in blood, hath risen a sun,
\nAnd other climes are radiant with its light;
\nBut thy fair shores, alas! it shines not on,
\nSave when some land, with its effulgence bright,
\nReflects the heavenly rays upon their moral night.<\/p>\n

Philosophy hath decked her form divine,
\nIn all her loveliest draperies, and wrought
\nHer brightest dreams by thee, thy shores her shrine,
\nThy sons her oracles, the kings of thought;
\nBut they have passed, and, save their names, are naught,
\nAnd their bright dreams are buried like their clay,
\nOr shattered, like the fanes where they were taught.
\nBut though religions, empires, men decay,
\nThou, restless, changeless flood — thou dost not pass away.<\/p>\n

There Poesy hath woven such fair dreams,
\nThat man hath deemed them bright reality;
\nThere she hath peopled hills, and vales, and streams,
\nAnd thy blue waters with her phantasy;
\nAnd fabled gods left heaven to roam by thee:
\nThere she embodied passions of the heart,
\nIn such fair forms, that frail morality
\nFailed to conceive, until triumphal Art
\nBade from the Parian stone the immortal image start.<\/p>\n

The loftiest bards, whose names illume the past,
\nHave sung upon thy shores; and thy deep tone
\nCeased at their Orphean lyres; — but now the last,
\n“The pilgrim bard,” whose matchless song alone
\nHad made thy name immortal as his own, —
\nA stranger of the north, but, “as it were
\nA child of thee,” his spirit too hath flown.
\nThus have the greatest passed. Thine azure air
\nStill echoes to their song, but thou alone art there.<\/p>\n

Thine empires, one by one, have fall’n, and now
\nThe last is crumbling in decay: — yes, she,
\nThe coronet upon thy furrowed brow,
\nThe mistress of the world, the queen of thee,
\nThe paradise of earth, sweet Italy;
\nStript of her queenly robes, in dust she lies,
\nEnchained by slaves<\/em>, nor struggling to be free.
\nThere hath she fallen, as the dolphin dies,
\nMore brightly beautiful in her last agonies.<\/p>\n

But though thy shores are sepulchres, that Time
\nHath peopled with dead empires; though they are
\nBut shattered wrecks, and every other clime
\nHath sprung from their decay; yet Nature there
\nHath made their pall<\/em>\u00a0of beauty sadly fair;
\nAnd they shall be, while thy blue waves shall foam,
\nThe Mecca of the world, — the altar, where
\nScience, Devotion, Genius, Art shall come,
\nAnd feel as Moslems feel above their prophet’s tomb.<\/p>\n

And thou, unchanging flood, that wanderest on,
\nThrough that dark path of ruin and decay,
\nStill must thou roll untended and alone.
\nMen shall arise, and shine, and pass away,
\nLike the bright bubbles of thy glittering spray;
\nAnd thrones shall totter, kingdoms be laid waste —
\nYea, empires rise and fall along thy way,
\nLike the dark heavings of thy troubled breast;
\nBut thou shalt still roll on — for thee there is no rest.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO THE SUN.<\/p>\n

Thou glorious lamp of Space! Thou that dost flood
\nThe void of heaven with brightness! in thy glow
\nUnnumbered worlds, age after age, have trod
\nIn their appointed paths, and yet the flow
\nOf brightness hath not ebbed. — Before thy brow
\nThe stars still veil themselves; thy burning glance
\nIs all unquenched, undimmed, unchanged e’en now,
\nAs when the finger of Omnipotence
\nPointed to thee thy throne amid the vast expanse.<\/p>\n

Yes, all unchanged. — As on that morn when rang
\nThe shout of joy as forth thy rays were spread,
\nWhile all the morning stars together sang,
\nSo thou art now. The morning stars have fled,
\nThe towering hill with age has bowed its head,
\nThe sea has changed its home with the dry land,
\nThe earth has gathered in her countless dead,
\nAgain and yet again — but thou dost stand,
\nExhaustless and unmoved, upheld by God’s own hand.<\/p>\n

Thy beams rest not alone where monarchs dwell,
\nThey linger round the cottage of the poor,
\nAnd pierce the grating of the captive’s cell;
\nAnd when thou lookest on the lowliest flower
\nThat lifts its head to thee for one short hour,
\nThy glances just as mildly, gently burn
\nAs when thou gazest on the loftiest tower,
\nOr on the countless worlds that round thee turn.
\nOh! what a lesson here might human frailty learn.<\/p>\n

Thou look’st upon the earth, and in thy rays
\nShe brings her increase forth. Thine early light
\nUnfolds the bud, and thy intenser gaze
\nThe blushing summer flower. Thou takest thy flight
\nAnd o’er the earth then walks the starry night;
\nThou guidest the waters of the unquiet main,
\nWhose billows foam and tremble in their might —
\nFor o’er the winds of heaven thou hold’st thy reign,
\nFrom the soft, flower-kissed breeze to the wild hurricane.<\/p>\n

When I behold thy bright, alchemic glance
\nA flood of gold-light o’er the landscape throw,
\nAnd every cloud that decks the blue expanse,
\nBeneath thy gaze with deeping blushes glow;
\nOr when I see thee tint the heavenly bow,
\nOr in thy gaze the icebound waters melt,
\nAs spring returns before thy burning brow,
\nI wonder not that Persia’s children knelt,
\nAnd deemed thou was the Heaven wherein the Eternal dwelt.<\/p>\n

Thou isle of brightness ‘mid an azure sea!
\nAs oft I gaze on thee at closing day,
\nI feel my spirit fluttering to be free, —
\nTo cast its bonds of ignorance away,
\nAnd learn thy mysteries; and then I say,
\nPeace, restless spirit! — yet a little time
\nAnd your frail prison will have changed to clay,
\nAnd thou shalt stand before the throne of Him
\nTo whose veiled brow of light this glorious lamp is dim!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

ON A PICTURE OF MY FATHER.<\/p>\n

I strive in vain those features to restore
\nTo Memory’s faded tablets, which on me,
\nFrom the mute ivory, beam so lovingly,
\nAnd to recall their living light once more.
\nIn vain I strive to pierce that veil of years,
\nAnd turn away all blinded with my tears.
\nBut sometimes when the garish day is passed,
\nAnd night and sleep their spell upon me cast,
\nThou comest to me, my father, from above,
\nAnd then for that brief moment I am blest,
\nFor I am folded to thy sheltering breast;
\nAnd in the sacred rapture of thy love
\nA holy spell is on my spirit laid:
\nThis mighty hunger of my heart is stayed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BYRON AMONG THE RUINS OF GREECE.
\n[A SCHOOL COMPOSITION.]<\/p>\n

On what sweet shore the blue AEgean laves,
\nWhere loveliness is wedded to decay, —
\nBeauty to desolation, — ‘mid the graves
\nOf an immortal race, and ruins, gray
\nWith the dim veil of years, a sleeper lay; —
\nAnd in his dream, Time’s never-ebbing tide
\nRolled back, and bore him to that earlier day,
\nWhen Greece was decked in beauty, like a bride,
\nGlory upon her path and freedom by her side.<\/p>\n

Against the radiance of her azure sky,
\nRose many a pillared fane, divinely wrought,
\nWhose marble forms defied mortality; —
\nThere pale Philosophy unveiled, and taught
\nHer mystic lore, and waged her war of thought,
\nAnd all her bright and baseless visions wove; —
\nThere Art her never-dying treasures brought:
\nHe saw Apelles’ glowing canvas move,
\nAnd at Pygmalion’s prayer the statue wake to love.<\/p>\n

Then came her bards, her orators and sages; —
\nOnce more he heard those voices that had rung
\nDown through the vista of succeeding ages:
\n“The blind old bard of Scio’s isle” there strung
\nHis matchless lyre, and breathed the earliest song:
\nAnd now Demosthenes before him stood,
\nPouring his tide of eloquence, that strong,
\nDeep and o’erwhelming, swayed the multitude,
\nAs the invisible wind sways the wild ocean’s flood.<\/p>\n

Armed warriors too were there, their helmets gleaming
\nOn deathless Marathon’s green, sea-girt plain,
\nThat now with Persia’s choicest blood was streaming:
\nThermopylae’s “three hundred” fought again;
\nAgain its pass was piled with countless slain,
\nFrom the invader’s host, as on that day
\nWhen Sparta’s bravest sons had vowed to drain
\nTheir heart’s best blood for her. There, as he lay,
\nThese glorious visions passed, in beautiful array.<\/p>\n

The dreamer woke, — he rested there alone,
\nBy that high temple whence had Pallas fled:
\nWhere once she lingered, now the crescent shone,
\nAnd round him wandered many a turbanned head,
\nTreading in mockery o’er the immortal dead;
\nAnd conscious Nature there, as if to screen
\nThe nakedness of Ruin, had ouspread
\nHer gayest flowers to deck her saddest scene,
\nAnd hung, o’er mouldering walls, her tapestry of green.<\/p>\n

And many a Grecian slave to Turkish foe
\nIn hopeless bondage bowed the unwilling knee,
\nAnd, all too weak to strike the avenging blow,
\nTo rend the galling chains of slavery,
\nAnd write their names once more among the free,
\nBut humbled in despair, unmoved behold
\nTheir shrine defaced, their altars borne away,
\nBy every plunderer, even the hallowed mould
\nOf Marathon itself, exchanged for foreign gold.<\/p>\n

And as he mused upon her buried worth,
\n‘Mid her fallen columns and her ruined fanes, —
\nThat none were there to lead her children forth;
\nTo strike with them, and burst their servile chains,
\nAnd with their blood to wash away the stains
\nThat their great name on Freedom’s record dyed, —
\nHe touched his harp, and the enchanting strains,
\nThe world was hushed to hear — and then aside
\nBade Poesy retire, and made sad Greece his bride.<\/p>\n

A fitting bride for one like him, who stood
\nOn that high steep, where few have dared their flight;
\nAgainst whose name Time’s all resistless flood
\nShall dash in vain; who, through decay and blight
\nAnd desolation, dazzled with the light
\nThat fast consumed him, where he stood on high,
\nLike a lone star on the dark brow of night: —
\nHe sleeps upon that shore — a Grecian sky,
\nFor a high soul like his, were fitting canopy.<\/p>\n

Rest, warrior bard! Above thy head shall bloom
\nThe greenest laurel of Peneus’ tide; —
\nGenius shall come a pilgrim to thy tomb,
\nAnd for her champion Freedom turn aside,
\nTo weep the bitter tears she may not hide;
\nAnd thy young handmaid, Poesy, shall shed
\nHer brightest halo there; and Greece, thy bride,
\nShall give to thee (and oh, can more be said!)
\nA name to live with hers — a home among her Dead.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SCIENCE.<\/p>\n

Darkness sat brooding o’er the infant world,
\nThat in chaotic gloom and silence lay,
\nTill from the throne of Light the sun was hurled;
\nThen that eternal night was changed to day,
\nAnd his effulgent, life-imparting ray,
\nO’er the wide waste of waters moved along:
\nThe land and sea divided, and away
\nFrom out their depths young Nature startled sprung,
\nAnd in the light rejoiced till the blue heavens rung.<\/p>\n

Even thus, oh! Science, hath thy glorious light
\nRolled the dark clouds of Ignorance away,
\nDispelled the darkness of a deeper night,
\nThan that which once o’er chaos thickly lay —
\nThe darkness of the mind; and thy mid-day
\nIs still far distant — yet nor time nor space
\nIs unillumined with thy heavenly ray:
\nThe clouds are rent that shrouded Nature’s face,
\nAnd now she stands unveiled in all her loveliness.<\/p>\n

Onward thou movest on thy tireless wing,
\nThrough air and sea to Earth’s remotest shore,
\nAnd givest a name to every living thing,
\nThe beast, the bird, the insect or the flower,
\nThe jewel of the mine, the sparkling ore.
\nThou knowest the mysteries of the unseen air;
\nThou lightest the caverns of the deep, whose floor
\nYields to thy hand its pearls and treasures rare,
\nAnd every tinted shell that breathes its music there.<\/p>\n

Now on the bosom of the swelling flood
\nThat clasps the earth, and by whose wave-worn side
\nIn ages past our trembling fathers stood,
\nNor dared to breast the deep and trackless tide,
\nOur floating palaces majestic ride,
\nTheir canvas whitening every foreign strand;
\nFor thou, oh Science, thou art there our guide —
\nLike that bright pillar reared at God’s command,
\nTo light his wandering sons through Egypt’s desert land.<\/p>\n

And by the radiance of that heavenly light
\nNow man may mark the wandering comet’s way.
\nMeasure the swiftness of the sunbeam’s flight,
\nCommand the elements and they obey.
\nO’er the whole earth he holds his godlike sway;
\nHe bids the river from its course be driven,
\nAnd lo! it flows where’er he points the way;
\nAnd from the skies the lightning he has riven,
\nAs erst Prometheus stole the sacred fire from heaven.<\/p>\n

Science! illumined by thy living rays,
\nA brighter glory lights the dome of night;
\nThere thou dost open to our wondering gaze
\nSystem on System round those worlds of light,
\nIn silence winging their harmonious flight.
\nAnd when weak sense returns to earth again,
\nThere we behold, when thou dost guide our sight,
\nAbove, around, where’er our gaze hath been,
\n“Infinity without, Infinity within.”<\/p>\n

Here hath thy sister, Art, upreared for thee
\nA stainless shrine where fair young spirits led
\nTo seek thy smile, shall bow the willing knee:
\nThey would not ask the radiance thou didst shed
\nAround a Newton’s or a Franklin’s head;
\nAlbeit a milder and a gentler ray,
\nThat through this world with loveliness o’erspread,
\nThey may not roam along the sunny way
\nIn dark and dreary night while all around is day.<\/p>\n

May time tread lightly through these classic halls;
\nLong may their columns stand through coming years,
\nWhen we who kneel within these snowy walls
\nHave passed away to yonder blessed spheres,
\nSecure from change, from parting, and from tears,
\nWhere our enfranchised spirits shall explore
\nThose boundless realms beyond the tide of years,
\nRapt, at the shrine of all creating power,
\nThrough endless time to learn, and wonder, and adore.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO A FRIEND,
\nON BEING ASKED FOR SOME VERSES.<\/p>\n

I thought the Soul of Song had made
\nThis heart of mine her sepulchre;
\nFor all her golden dreams had fled,
\nAnd I could win no note from her.<\/p>\n

But when for thee thou bid’st her sing,
\nThat spell dissolves her icy chain;
\nShe slowly plumes her drooping wing,
\nAnd strikes her shattered chords again.<\/p>\n

For more than lifeless would she be,
\nIf thou shouldst bid her wake in vain;
\nAnd lost her chords, if still for thee
\nShe could not wake one living strain.<\/p>\n

For thee — that hours of deep distress,
\nAnd days of gloom with kindness lit,
\nTill half I blessed the bitterness
\nThat gave me thee to sweeten it.<\/p>\n

For thee — that when, despairing long,
\nI said, “No friend has earth for me,”
\nDidst bid the tones die on my tongue,
\nAnd I could utter, “only thee.”<\/p>\n

For thee — that when my mother earth
\nShall call me to her sheltering breast,
\nOf all I know wilt weep alone
\nAbove my nameless place of rest.<\/p>\n

But see! her wings refuse to fly;
\nHer chords are harsh from silence long;
\nAlas! thy gentle sorcery
\nHath summoned but the ghost of Song.<\/p>\n

She hovers o’er her living tomb,
\nShe seeks once more her grave and chain,
\nAs spectres haunt the midnight gloom:
\nSweet friend, awake her not again.<\/p>\n

If o’er the wind harp’s gentle strings
\nThe threatening tempest rudely flies,
\nIt does not wake more thrilling strains —
\nThe chords are rent, the music dies.<\/p>\n

Thus is my harp, thus is my song —
\nI woo in vain its sweetness fled,
\nThe storms have swept the chords too long,
\nThe music of my soul is dead.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO THE CENTURY PLANT.<\/p>\n

Plant of a hundred years! destroying Time
\nPasses thy gentle race with hurrying trend,
\nLeaves their bright petals colorless and dim,
\nStrews with their withered leaves the mossy bed,
\nAnd sweeps them onward with the countless dead,
\nEre the swift passing of the summer hour —
\nBut, beauteous flower, above thy towering head
\nAn age hath passed and left no trace of power:
\nPlant of a hundred years, thou seem’st Time’s favorite flower!<\/p>\n

I would that he had passed less lightly o’er thee,
\nAnd on thy polished leaves some record made,
\nOf all the scenes that long since passed before thee,
\nWhen round thee waved a forest, in whose shade
\nThe Indian lover wooed his dusky maid, —
\nWhen the red warriors lit their council fires,
\nAs peal\u00e9d the war-cry over hill and glade,
\nAnd then in triumph raised the funeral pyre
\nOf the ill-fated captive, bride, or son, or sire.<\/p>\n

Alas, fair flower! they’ve vanished from the earth,
\nThat wronged and injured race, and none are here
\nOf all the friends that knew thee at thy birth, —
\nNo longer near thee rests the wearied deer,
\nThy sister flowers have faded with each year;
\nStill thou remainest, though they all have flown,
\nLike some strange being from another sphere,
\nOr like some aged man, sad and alone, —
\nMay I not linger here, when those I love are gone!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WRITTEN AT TIVOLI FALLS,
\n(NEAR ALBANY.)<\/p>\n

Sweet Tivoli! upon thy grassy side,
\nWhene’er I linger through the summer day,
\nAnd the soft music of thy silvery tide
\nSo sweetly wiles the lagging hours away,
\nI cannot deem but thou are e’en as fair
\nAs that Italian vale whose name thy waters bear.<\/p>\n

O’er the old rocks thou boundest on thy way,
\nand wood, and glen, re-echo to thy song;
\nAnd then thy waters, weary of their play,
\nThrough the long grass glide silently along,
\nSo slow, and calm, as scarce to break the rest
\nOf the young flowers that sleep upon thy placid breast.<\/p>\n

And sure no flowers are lovelier than these
\nThat bloom so sweetly on thy grassy side,
\nAnd none more fair than the young forest trees,
\nThat bathe their branches in thy crystal tide;
\nNo sounds are sweeter than the winds at play
\nAmid these trembling pines at close of summer day.<\/p>\n

Here by thy side I cannot feel alone;
\nAbove my head the sheltering branches bend,
\nAnd at my feet the flowers; and thy low tone
\nBreathes softly in my ear, and, like a friend
\nSoothing my spirit, comes the perfumed air,
\nTo kiss my fevered brow and play amid my hair.<\/p>\n

Oh! when I turn me from the busy throng,
\nChilled with their frozen words and heartless smiles,
\nI wander here, and thy melodious song,
\nAnd this sweet scene, my sadder mood beguiles;
\nAnd when I mingle with the crowd again,
\nMore calm and holy thoughts flow through my burning brain.<\/p>\n

Oft as I wander in these shadowy groves
\nMy wayward fancy spreads her truant wing,
\nAnd through the past delightedly she roves,
\nFrom its recesses many a scene to bring
\nOf that far time, when, ‘mid the deepening shade,
\nThe Indian lover wooed, and won, his dusky maid.<\/p>\n

And then she bears me on through future years,
\nWhen her frail prison will have passed away,
\nAnd she will look, with eyes undimmed by tears,
\nUpon the glories of a brighter day;
\nAnd still thy waves will glide as soft along;
\nAnd still thy praise be sung in many a sweeter song.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LA FAYETTE.<\/p>\n

The wail of France comes o’er the sea, —
\nShe mourns for thee, departed chief;
\nAnd we, the children of the Free,
\nRe-echo back the notes of grief.<\/p>\n

Thy course was like the morning sun,
\nThat lights two worlds, the east and west;
\nThy brilliant, glorious race is run,
\nThou takest thine eternal rest.<\/p>\n

Thy fame shall pass from age to age,
\nFrom clime to clime, from sire to son;
\nAnd History, on her glowing page,
\nShall write thy name with Washington.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

The brilliant west is glowing,
\nWith sunset’s farewell ray;
\nThe silver waves are flowing,
\nOn to the distant sea;<\/p>\n

The pale bright stars are keeping
\nTheir watch through night’s still hours;
\nThe dews in joy are weeping
\nAbove the new-born flowers;<\/p>\n

The city’s hum is dying
\nUpon the perfumed breeze,
\nThat wanders, softly sighing,
\nAmong the flower-crowned trees.<\/p>\n

But my vagrant thoughts are roaming
\nTo loved ones far away;
\nI heed not twilight’s coming,
\nNor flowers, nor winds at play.<\/p>\n

Of a low, sweet voice I’m dreaming,
\nMore soft than the southwinds are,
\nOf a gentle eye that is beaming,
\nMore bright than the Evening Star;<\/p>\n

And I read as many pages
\nIn the depths of that hazel eye,
\nAs were read by the Chaldean sages,
\nIn the glittering stars on high;<\/p>\n

And the dreams that float under the cover
\nOf those snowy lids of thine,
\nThe thoughts in that young heart that hover,
\nI have magic power to divine.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE EARTH TO THE SUN.<\/p>\n

Oh Sun! oh glorious Sun!
\nThe spell of winter binds me strong and dread
\nIn the dark sleep, the coldness of the dead;
\nAnd song and beauty from thy haunts are gone.<\/p>\n

The skies above me lower,
\nThe frozen tempests beat upon my breast,
\nThat wearily by its snow-shroud is prest;
\nAnd the wild winds rave o’er me in mad power.<\/p>\n

At thine averted gaze,
\nBenumbed and desolate, I droop and die:
\nLife of my life! Lord of my destiny!
\nShine on me with thy life-imparting rays.<\/p>\n

Look from thy radiant throne,
\nAnd o’er this waste, drear and unlovely now,
\nYoung summer’s gorgeous loveliness shall glow,
\nAnd beauty clasp me in her magic zone.<\/p>\n

Fair landscapes shall arise,
\nO’er which a sky of tenderest blue shall bend,
\nWhere forest, hill, and vale, and stream shall blend
\nIn beauty like a dream of Paradise.<\/p>\n

And in thy living beams
\nThe flowers shall wake, and every dewy cup
\nShall send the homage of its perfume up,
\nAnd give thy brightness back in rosy gleams.<\/p>\n

A full deep symphony,
\nThe voice of streams, the air’s melodious sighs,
\nSongs from all living things shall mingling rise
\nIn one eternal hymn of love to thee.<\/p>\n

* * * * * *<\/p>\n

In vain, oh Earth, in vain; —
\nWhat heeds the Sun, if light or shadow rest
\nUpon the bosom in his smile so blest,
\nOr if thou perish in thine icy chain.<\/p>\n

If from the shining host,
\nLike the lost Pleiad, thou wert stricken down,
\nHe would not miss thee from his starry crown —
\nHe would not mark one ray of brightness lost.<\/p>\n

Then for the song and bloom,
\nThe untold wealth of beauty, buried deep
\nWithin thy frozen heart, in death-like sleep,
\nOh! mourn thou not within thy conscious tomb.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

Upon the sea of life,
\nOutspread thy spirit’s sails; —
\nGo in thy genius forth, and breast
\nIts billows and its gales.<\/p>\n

Weigh anchor and depart —
\nWhy linger on the shore?
\nSeize helm and guide thy spirit’s bark
\nThese untried waters o’er.<\/p>\n

Dread only the dead calm,
\nHeed not the sky’s dark frown;
\nAnd if to shipwreck thou art doomed,
\nGo in the tempest down.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

BRYANT.<\/p>\n

Like the ancient Grecian marbles,
\nIs his soul with beauty fraught,
\nAnd as polished and enduring
\nIs the sculpture of his thought.<\/p>\n

In the Pantheon of our country,
\nThe Valhalla of her fame,
\nOn the record of her poets,
\nFirst of all is traced his name.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DURAND.<\/p>\n

Upon his canvas Nature starts to life,
\nClear waters flow, majestic trees arise, —
\nThe earth and air with beauty’s shapes are rife,
\nAnd over all there bend his glorious skies.<\/p>\n

Yes, this is Nature — living, breathing, warm,
\nEre yet her face the blight and storm have crossed;
\nYes, this is Nature, in that radiant form
\nShe wore of old, ere Paradise was lost.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO DR. ________.<\/p>\n

I know those subtle elements
\nThou dost administer,
\nHave power to stay the parting breath,
\nThe languid pulse to stir.<\/p>\n

And not less potent is thy smile,
\nThy sympathizing tone,
\nThy tender heart that ever makes
\nThe sufferer’s pain its own.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO A POET’S WIFE.<\/p>\n

She, who in lonely pride may wear
\nThe laurel on her brow,
\nAnd sit beneath its chilling shade,
\nIs far less blest than thou.<\/p>\n

A higher happiness is thine,
\nTo hear the voice of Fame
\nRe-echo in her silver tones,
\nThe one beloved name.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD.<\/p>\n

“Heaven lies about us in our infancy.”<\/p>\n

Sweet child of fairy land! since first
\nI dwelt, with tearful eye,
\nUpon the page that tells thy tale,
\nLong years have glided by.<\/p>\n

Then, in thy fabled history,
\nNo marvel could I see;
\nFor then the worlds of thought and sense
\nWere fairy lands to me.<\/p>\n

The fields and meadows were as bright
\nAs those where thou didst stray; —
\nAnd gaily through their tangled flowers,
\nLike thee I took my way.<\/p>\n

And while I walked that sunny path,
\nNor doubt nor fear was mine;
\nFor childhood’s trustfulness and faith
\nAre ever strong, like thine.<\/p>\n

Alas! that coming years should throw
\nDark shadows o’er our way;
\nAnd leave us with this aching sense
\nOf glory passed away.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

Thou dost not dwell in this dark world of ours,
\nWhere sorrow, want, and crime, and misery reign;
\nWhere famine stalks; where war’s dread tempest lowers;
\nWhere stands the scaffold, and where clanks the chain.<\/p>\n

But far upon the future’s unreached shore,
\nThe promised land to be our heritage;
\nThere thou, in tranc\u00e9d visions, dost restore
\nThe vanished glories of the Golden Age.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

CHENEY.<\/p>\n

The Paint-King, envious of his cunning art,
\nTo him the tinted palette would not lend;
\nSo has he dipped the pencil in his heart,
\nAnd with his light and shade its hues still blend.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________.<\/p>\n

They may talk of the eloquence famous in story;
\nOf the names that through ages continue to shine;
\nThere never has fallen more true oratory
\nFrom the lips of a mortal, than falleth from thine.<\/p>\n

With pathos and passion, oh! not more replete
\nIs the bard, though at Helicon’s fountain he sips;
\nNor his accents more glowing, persuasive, and sweet,
\nThough the bees of Hymettus had fed on his lips.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ________ ________.<\/p>\n

Like the river’s current rapid;
\nLike the lightning’s flash intense;
\nWas the rushing, fiery torrent
\nOf thy fervid eloquence.<\/p>\n

And the multitude that listened
\nTo each breathing, burning word,
\nLike the ocean by the tempest,
\nTo its quiet depths was stirred.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

EPIGRAM.<\/p>\n

A draught from Helicon could once inspire
\nThe bard to wing in song his loftiest flight;
\nBut poets of these later times require
\nA draft from Wall Street, payable at sight<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TO ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.<\/p>\n

I have not met thee in this outward world,
\nBounded by time and space; but in that realm,
\nO’er which imagination holds her reign,
\nThere have I seen thy spirit face to face,
\nMajestic, and yet lovely. There have I
\nSat at thy feet to listen to thy voice,
\nAnd as the symphony sublimely rose,
\nReverence and awe had held me spell-bound there,
\nBut that there fell upon my listening ear
\nLow breathing sighs, the sound of falling tears,
\nThe under-tone of human love and woe,
\nThat touched the trembling chords of sympathy,
\nAnd drew me near to thy great woman’s heart.<\/p>\n

Thou crown\u00e9d queen of Song! from this free land
\nThat owes allegiance only unto God
\nAnd Genius, his anointed, o’er the sea
\nI send my vows of homage, and my heart
\nSends love and blessings unto thee and thine.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SONNET.
\nMILTON.<\/p>\n

Oh bard! what though upon thy mortal eyes
\nThere fell no glimmering ray of earthly light,
\nAnd the deep shadow of eternal night
\nShut from thy gaze our lovely earth and skies,
\nYet was it to thy spirit’s vision given
\nTo gaze upon the splendors of that shore
\nEye had not seen, nor heart conceived before.
\nThen didst thou, Poet Laureate of heaven,
\nSing of those courts and of that angel host,
\nOf that majestic Spirit who in vain
\nDared, warred, and fell, never to rise again,
\nAnd of that Paradise so early lost,
\nIn strains “posterity shall not let die,”
\nIn “thoughts that wander through eternity.”<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

NIGHTFALL IN HUNGARY.<\/p>\n

As when the sun in darkness sets,
\nAnd night falls on the earth,
\nAlong the azure fields above
\nThe stars of heaven come forth;<\/p>\n

So when the sun of Liberty
\nGrows dim to mortal eyes,
\nFrom out the gloom, like radiant stars,
\nThe world’s true heroes rise.<\/p>\n

The men of human destiny,
\nWhom glorious dreams inspire;
\nHigh-priests of Freedom, in whose souls
\nIs shrined the sacred fire.<\/p>\n

The fire that through the wilderness
\nIn steadfast lustre streams;
\nThat on the future, dim and dark,
\nSheds its effulgent beams.<\/p>\n

Thus, oh Hungaria! through the night
\nThat wraps thee in its gloom,
\nLight from one burning soul streams forth,
\nA torch above thy tomb.<\/p>\n

Thy tomb! oh no — the mouldering shroud
\nThe worm awhile must wear,
\nEre, from its confines springing forth,
\nHe wings the upper air.<\/p>\n

Thy tomb! then from its door ere long
\nThe stone shall roll away,
\nThou shalt come forth, and once again
\nGreet the new-risen day.<\/p>\n

The day that prayed and waited for
\nSo long, shall surely rise,
\nAs surely as to-morrow’s sun
\nAgain shall greet our eyes.<\/p>\n

What though before the shape evoked
\nThe coward heart has quailed,
\nAnd when the hour, the moment came,
\nThe recreant arm has failed: —<\/p>\n

What though the apostate wields the sword
\nWith fratricidal hand,
\nAnd the last Romans wander forth
\nIn exile o’er the land: —<\/p>\n

What though suspended o’er thee hangs
\nThe Austrian’s glittering steel;
\nWhat though thy heart is crushed beneath
\nThe imperial Cossack’s heel: —<\/p>\n

Not to the swift is given the race,
\nThe battle to the strong;
\nUp to the listening ear of God
\nIs borne the mighty wrong.<\/p>\n

From Him the mandate has gone forth,
\nThe giant Power must fall;
\nOh Prophet! read’st thou not the doom,
\nThe writing on the wall!<\/p>\n

The slaves of Power, the sword, the scourge,
\nThe scaffold and the chain,
\nAwhile may claim their hecatombs
\nOf hero martyrs slain.<\/p>\n

But they that war with Tyranny
\nStill mightier weapons bear;
\nWinged, arrowy thoughts, that pierce like light,
\nImpalpable as air.<\/p>\n

Thoughts that strike through the triple mail,
\nThat spread, and burn, and glow,
\nMore quenchless than that fire the Greeks
\nRained on their Moslem foe.<\/p>\n

Rest, rest in peace, heroic shades,
\nWhose blood like water ran:
\nFor every crimson drop ye shed,
\nShall rise an arm\u00e9d man.<\/p>\n

Rest, rest in peace, heroic souls,
\nWho wander still on earth;
\nTHOUGHTS, your immortal messengers,
\nAre on their mission forth.<\/p>\n

The pioneers of Liberty,
\nInvincible they throng;
\nThey scale and undermine the towers
\nAnd battlements of Wrong.<\/p>\n

Speak! Sages, Poets, Patriots, speak!
\nAnd the dark pile shall fall,
\nAs at the Prophet’s trumpet tones
\nOnce fell the city’s wall.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

REQUIEM.<\/p>\n

To what bright world afar didst thou belong,
\nThou whose pure soul seemed not of mortal birth?
\nFrom what fair clime of flowers and love and song,
\nCam’st thou, a star beam to our shadowed earth?
\nWhat hadst thou done, sweet spirit in that sphere,
\nThat thou wert banished here?<\/p>\n

Here, where our blossoms early fade and die,
\nWhere autumn frosts despoil our loveliest bowers,
\nWhere song goes up to heaven an anguished cry
\nFrom wounded hearts, like perfume from crushed flowers;
\nWhere Love despairing waits and weeps in vain,
\nHis Psyche to regain.<\/p>\n

Thou cam’st not unattended on thy way; —
\nSpirits of grace and beauty, joy and love,
\nWere with thee ever, bearing each some ray
\nFrom the far home that thou hadst left above;
\nAnd ever at thy side, upon our sight
\nGleamed forth their wings of light.<\/p>\n

We heard their voices in the gushing song
\nThat rose like incense from thy poet heart;
\nWe saw the footsteps of the shining throng
\nGlancing upon thy pathway, high apart,
\nWhere in thy radiance thou didst walk the earth,
\nThou child of glorious birth.<\/p>\n

But the way lengthened and the song grew sad,
\nBreathing those tones that find no echo here;
\nAspiring, soaring, but no longer glad,
\nIts mournful music fell upon the ear:
\n‘Twas the home-sickness of a soul that sighs
\nFor its own native skies.<\/p>\n

Then he that to earth’s children comes at last,
\nThe angel-messenger, white-robed and pale,
\nUpon thy soul his sweet oblivion cast,
\nAnd bore thee gently through the shadowy vale,
\nThe fleeting years of thy brief exile o’er,
\nHome to the blissful shore.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

PROMETHEUS.
\nSONNET.<\/p>\n

Thou brave old Titan, that in chains didst lie,
\nBound to the rock on the Caucasian hill,
\nWho by sublime endurance didst defy
\nImperial Jove and all his shapes of ill;
\nAs I invoke thy spirit here to-day, —
\nFrom the old Pagan world thou speak’st to me,
\nI hear thy voice across Time’s sounding sea,
\nBid me thus bear and conquer. — I obey.
\nHenceforth, like thee, I will endure and wait
\nOn life’s bleak summit bound, without dismay.
\nThen in thine iron car roll on thy way,
\nThou stern, relentless power that men call Fate,
\nLoose then thy bolts thou dark and threat’ning sky —
\nThou vulture at my heart, feed to satiety!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

WEBSTER.<\/p>\n

“When I and all those that hear me shall have gone to our last home, and
\nwhen the mould may have gathered on our memories, as it will on our
\ntombs:” — Webster’s Speech in the Senate, July, 1850<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The mould upon thy memory! — No,
\nNot while one note is rung,
\nOf those divine, immortal songs
\nMilton and Shakespeare sung; —
\nNot till the night of years enshrouds
\nThe Anglo-Saxon tongue.<\/p>\n

No! let the flood of Time roll on,
\nAnd men and empires die; —
\nGenius enthroned on lofty heights
\nCan its dread course defy,
\nAnd here on earth, can claim the gift
\nOf immortality:<\/p>\n

Can save from that Lethean tide
\nThat sweeps so dark along,
\nA people’s name; — a people’s fame
\nTo future time prolong,
\nAs Troy still lives and only lives
\nIn Homer’s deathless song.<\/p>\n

What though to buried Nineveh
\nThe traveller may come,
\nAnd roll away the stone that hides
\nThat long forgotten tomb; —
\nHe questions its mute past in vain,
\nIts oracles are dumb.<\/p>\n

What though he stand where Balbec stood
\nGigantic in its pride;
\nNo voice comes o’er that silent waste,
\nLone, desolate and wide; —
\nThey had no bard, no orator,
\nNo statesman, — and they died.<\/p>\n

They lived their little span of life,
\nThey lived and died in vain; —
\nThey sank ingloriously beneath
\nOblivion’s silent reign,
\nAs sank beneath the Dead Sea wave
\nThe Cities of the Plain.<\/p>\n

But for those famed, immortal lands,
\nGreece and imperial Rome,
\nWhere Genius left its shining mark,
\nAnd found its chosen home,
\nAll eloquent with mind they speak,
\nWood, wave and crumbling dome.<\/p>\n

The honeyed words of Plato still
\nFloat on the echoing air,
\nThe thunders of Demosthenes
\nAEgean waters bear,
\nAnd the pilgrim to the Forum hears
\nThe voice of Tully there.<\/p>\n

And thus thy memory shall live,
\nAnd thus thy fame resound,
\nWhile far-off future ages roll
\nTheir solemn cycles round,
\nAnd make this wide, this fair New World
\nAn ancient, classic ground.<\/p>\n

Then with our Country’s glorious name
\nThine own shall be entwined;
\nWithin the Senate’s pillared hall
\nThine image shall be shrined;
\nAnd on the nation’s Law shall gleam
\nLight from thy giant mind.<\/p>\n

Our proudest monuments no more
\nMay rise to meet the sky,
\nThe stately Capitol o’erthrown,
\nLow in the dust may lie;
\nBut mind, sublime above the wreck,
\nImmortal — cannot die.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Edited by Kevin Cawley from the enlarged edition (New York: Putnam, 1852). Anne Charlotte Lynch, author, b. in Bennington, Vt., in 1820. Her father was a native of Dublin, Ireland, who, at the age of sixteen, joined the rebel forces under Lord Edward Fitzgerald. He was captured, and remained a prisoner four years, when, still […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5084,"featured_media":0,"parent":41,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-106","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5084"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/106\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":161,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/106\/revisions\/161"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/41"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/wcawley\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}