Poems by Miss H. F. Gould | ||
3. VOLUME III.
BLOWING BUBBLES.
Making head and heart to ache,
Are the fruit of blowing bubbles,
Bright to view, but quick to break.
Breathing hard to swell the sides
Of a shining, fluid vessel,
Frailer than the air it rides.
All the bubble mania show,
Oft our richest wealth comprising
In the bubbles that we blow.
Pleased, we mark them in their flight,
Every hue of iris showing,
As they glance along the light.
With their crystal walls so thin,
Each presents the wicked fairy,
Vanity, enthroned within!
What of either do we find?
Not so much as one gay feather
Flying Hope has left behind!
Every one, some empty ball;
So the seeds of mischief sowing,
Where, to burst, the bubbles fall.
Is our evil harvest found;
Oft, with pipe and cup, we rather
Step upon our neighbor's ground.
While the glistening playthings rise,
We may doom a friend or brother
To a life of care and sighs.
I can point a thousand ways
Where this bubble-making glory
Has in darkness hid its rays!
Caused the world by giving names;
Since a right to some delusion
Every one from nature claims!
INFANT FAITH.
Was the little beauteous child,
Sporting round a fountain bright,
Playing through the flowerets wild.
Cautious not a leaf to crush;
Then about the fount he leaped,
Shouting at its merry gush.
Laughing as they bubbled up,
In his lily hands he held,
Closely clasped, a silver cup.
Then he bore it to the flowers,
Through his fingers there to spill
What it held, in mimic showers.
“Open to the air and sun;
So, to-morrow I may see
What my rain to-day has done.
For the drink I give you now,
Burst your little cups, and blow,
When I'm gone, and can't tell how!
How God's finger touches you,
When your sides unclasp, and free,
Let your leaves and odors through.
Nor in darkness be afraid,
Only once to see aright
How a beauteous flower is made.
In the morning from my bed,
Here to find among you some
With your brightest colors spread!”
At the dewy morning hour,
Crying, with a joyous shout,
“God has made of each a flower!”
Of the little children be,
In the sight of Him, who saith,
“Suffer them to come to me.”
Is the infant's offering found,
Though “a cup of water given,”
Even to the thirsty ground.
PATTY PROUD.
Her feelings are lowery, her frown like a cloud;
Because proud Miss Patty can hardly endure
To come near the lowly abode of the poor.
Her silk shoes and hose, and her skirt-bottom soil;
And so she goes winching; and holds up her dress
So high, it were well if her heels would show less.
She puts on fine airs, and displays her rich gown;
Till some, whom she passes, will think of the bird
Renowned for gay feathers, whose name you have heard.
As that silly fowl, taking pride in his train;
And none, who have marked her, will need to be told
That she has a heart hard, and haughty, and cold.
Who asked her for alms, she turned frowning away;
And told them, “Poor people must work, to be fed,
And not trouble ladies, to help them to bread.”
Their mother was dying, their father was dead,
She entered a store, with a smooth, smiling face,
To lay out her purse in gay ribbons and lace.
Because Ellen Pitiful picked up the cane,
A feeble old man had let fall in the sand,
And placed it again in his tremulous hand.
Of all, whom she visits, that any one knows
How stern she can look, when she 's out of their sight,
And fret at the servants, if all is not right.
Her friends, when she 's absent, esteem it no loss;
And some, where she visits, in secret confess,
That they love her no more, though they dread her much less.
To govern her temper, or conquer her pride.
The passions, unchecked in the heart of the child,
Like weeds in a garden neglected, ran wild.
Her head, not then righted, has ever been wrong;
Of faults, by long habit made stubborn and bold.
A fair little girl is there under the sun,
Who 'd rise to a woman, and have it allowed
That she is a likeness of Miss Patty Proud?
I CAUGHT A BIRD.
So near my window lifted high,
She softly ventured in, to spy
What I might be about:
And then, a little wildered thing,
Like many a one without a wing,
She fluttered, struck, and seemed to sing,
“Alas! I can't get out.”
Before her, sporting light and free;
But felt a power, she could not see,
Repel and hold her back.
In vain her beak, and breast, and feet
Against the crystal pane were beat:
She could not break the clear deceit,
Nor find her airy track.
And felt her frame with terror shook:
She gave the sad and piteous look
Of helplessness and fear;
Till quick I spread my hand, to show,
I caught her but to let her go;
And I, perhaps, may never know
A dearer moment here.
As, humming on the air, she threw
Her brilliant, buoyant wing, and flew
Away from fear and me:
But, ere the hour of setting sun,
That little constant, grateful one,
Returning, had her hymn begun
In our old rustling tree.
My tender bird to kill, or maim;
Nor let the fatal shot proclaim
Her anguish, or her fall!
But, would you know the bird I mean,
She is the first that will be seen—
The last—and every one between:
She represents them all!
THE FLOWER OF SHELLS AND SILVER WIRE.
Among the soft locks of thy fine silken hair;
And asked the two deeps for some treasure or gem,
By nature first formed and imbosomed in them.
The ocean cast up its smooth shells to the shore:
Of these I combined the free offering, that now
I bring, and would set o'er thy fair, peaceful brow.
The silver is modest, and precious, and bright,—
A type! thy quick fancy will readily see,
Yet thou 'lt not confess what its meaning may be.
The friend, by whose hand its pure parts were combined;
But, oftener, that Friend, in whose hand was the skill
The earth and the seas with their treasures to fill!
THE LITTLE BLIND BOY.
That tosses so gently the curls of my hair!
It breathes on my lip, and it fans my warm cheek,
But gives me no answer, though often I speak:
I feel it play o'er me, refreshing and light,
And yet cannot touch it, because I 've no sight!
I sink, and I mount, with its cadence and swell,
While thrilled to my heart, with its deep-going strain,
Till pleasure excessive seems turning to pain.
Now, what the bright colors of music may be,
Will any one tell me? for I cannot see.
What are they?—on what kind of wings do they fly?
Are not they sweet angels, who come to delight
A poor little boy, that knows nothing of sight?
The sun, moon and stars never enter my mind.
O tell me what light is, because I am blind!
THE SALE OF THE WATER-LILY.
That o'er a moorland lay,
A widow's low and lone abode,
And close beside the way.
The signs of times within,
That seemed to say but little more
Than, “Better days have been!”
With alder, brake, and brush;
And less to serve the wants of men,
Than of the jay and thrush.
The widow with a song,
To let her feel a neighbor near,
And wing an hour along.
With lilies bordered round,
Was found among the richest things,
That blessed the widow's ground.
That wound the meadow through,
Which from the pond its being took,
And had its treasures too.
For, children she had three;
She called him, though a little one,
Her hope for days to be.
If, from the tender shoot,
We know the way the branch will grow;
Or, by the flower, the fruit.
His temper smooth and mild:
He was—the parent's chief delight—
A good and pleasant child.
The winter fire to make;
And help his mother dress their food,
Or tend the baking cake.
His little sisters out,
To pick wild berries on the mead,
And fish the brook for trout.
Some little gain; and hence,
Contrived the silver pond to turn,
In part, to silver pence.
So spicy sweet to smell,
He plucked them up to sell.
He had too young a head,
The distant city's ways to know;
The route he could not tread.
To pass his humble cot,
His bunch of lilies to be sold
Was ready on the spot.
His treasures up to show,
That looked like yellow stars of gold
Just set in leaves of snow.
“You'll find them new and sweet:
So fresh from out the pond are they,
I have n't dried my feet!”
Upon his garment's hem,
Where late the water-drops had hung,
When he had gathered them.
To take the lilies in,
His artless orphan tongue and face
Some bright return would win.
With open purse, was seen,
To cast a coin upon the sand,
Or on the sloping green.
The child a silver piece;
And thus, as fast as lilies grew,
He saw his wealth increase.
Was gathered by their sale,
His widowed mother's frugal store
Would never wholly fail.
Her little children fed.
He knew her trust: her cry he heard;
And answered it with bread.
Who made the lily fair,
Her orphans, like the meadow flower,
Grew up in beauty there.
Who wisely thus began,
Was long the aged widow's joy;
And lived an honored man.
“The Lily” as a name,
And how his fortune came.
Her emblem, on her stem;
And she was called, by all she met,
A beauteous ocean gem.
And, on the waters wide,
Her sails, as lily-leaves, were white:
Her name was well applied.
The faces of the poor;
And found that all he gave returned
In blessing rich and sure.
Had drawn his heart above,
In after life preserved the bond
Of grateful, holy love.
THE SILVER BIRDSNEST.
We were shown a beautiful specimen of the ingenuity of birds, a few days since, by Dr. Cook, of this borough. It was a birdsnest made entirely of silver wires, beautifully woven together. The nest was found on a sycamore tree, on the Condorus, by Dr. Francis Beard, of York county. It was the nest of a hanging-bird; and the material was probably obtained from a soldier's epaulet, which it had found.
Westchester Village Record. Spring of 1838.The waters cast ashore,
A little winged rover met,
And eyed it o'er and o'er.
The silver bright so pleased her sight,
On that lone, idle vest,
She knew not why she should deny
Herself a silver nest.
Then bore it to her bough,
Where, on a flowery twig 't was curled—
The bird can show you how:—
But, when enough of that bright stuff
The cunning builder bore
Her house to make, she would not take,
Nor did she covet more.
While neither pride nor guilt
Had entered in her pretty plan,
Her resting-place had built;
About her own light form,
Of these, inlaid with skill, she made
A lining soft and warm.
She fondled there, and fed,
Were prouder, when they understood
The sheen about their bed?
Do you suppose they ever rose
Of higher powers possessed,
Because they knew they peeped and grew
Within a silver nest?
THE QUAKER FLOWER.
A TRIFOLIUM FROM THE GRAVE OF PENN.
That hath a kind of spirit power
To hold me captive, hour by hour,
In pleasant musing lost;
'T was plucked for me in distant land,
And by another's friendly hand,
From turf where I may never stand;
Then yon wild ocean crossed.
Bearing a sweet, but humble name;
Yet worthy of a glorious fame
Among the sons of men;
For O the pretty stranger grew:
It drank the ether and the dew,
And from light received its hue
Upon the grave of Penn!
Unclosed its eye, and smiled around,
Upon the verdure of the mound,
Where William's ashes rest;
Where low the dust in quiet lies
Of him, among the good and wise
On earth, so meek, and in the skies
So high among the blest.
Or seed wherefrom a germ might shoot
For one young plant to be the fruit
Of that small vital part,
Fair Penn-Sylvania, it should be,
My friendly offering made to thee—
Set, to thy father's memory,
On thy kind Quaker heart.
The snow-white sheet beneath its head,
And on its tender bosom spread,
Shows that its life is o'er:
And though each floweret of the gem,
And every leaf, is on the stem,
I cannot spare thee one of them,
Because there'll grow no more.
This simple wreath, which thou 'lt receive
In lieu thereof; and thence believe
My fervent wish to be,
That Heaven, to overflowing still,
With purest bliss thy cup may fill,
And guard thee safe from every ill,
Whilst thou rememberest me!
THE HUMMING-BIRD'S ANGER.
“Small as the humming-bird is, it has great courage and violent passions. If it find a flower that has been deprived of its honey, it will pluck it off, throw it on the ground, and sometimes tear it to pieces.”
Buffon.With plumes many-hued as the bow of the sky,
Suspended in ether, they shine in the light,
As jewels of nature, high-finished and bright.
They hang o'er the flowers, as too airy to fall,
Upborne on their beautiful pinions, that seem
Like glittering vapor, or parts of a dream.
Of course, 't is a sweet little creature, you know:
But sweet little creatures have sometimes, they say,
A great deal that 's bitter or sour to betray.
Is found of a very high temper possessed:
Such essence of anger within it is pent,
'T would burst, did no safety-valve give it a vent.
Uncorked by its heat the offender to scath;
And taking occasion to let off its ire,
'T is startling to witness how high it will fire.
And darted that sharp little member, the tongue,
At once through the tube to its cell for the sweet
It felt, at the bottom, most certain to meet.
To rifle the store, had already been there,
And no drop of honey for her to draw up,
Her vengeance was poured on the destitute cup.
And, cuffing and shaking the innocent flower,
Its tender corolla in shred after shred
She hastily stripped, then she snapped off its head.
That bright little fury went humming away,
With gossamer softness, and fair to the eye,
Like some living brilliant just dropped from the sky.
Arrayed in rich colors, and dusted with gold,
I cannot but think of the wrath and the spite,
She has in reserve, though they 're kept out of sight.
If plumeless or plumy, without or with wings,
Should go to the glass, or the painter, and sit
When anger is just at the height of its fit.
THE SABBATH.
Hallowed by Jehovah's rest!
When his six-days' work was done,
Holy rose the seventh sun.
And the Lord pronounced them good,
Morning stars together sang—
Heaven with Sabbath praises rang.
Like a gem, before his throne,
While he marked thee, as his claim—
And he sealed thee with his name.
At thy dawn the grave gave way
To the power of him within,
Who had, sinless, bled for sin.
First, for man, the dismal tomb,
When its bars their weakness owned,
There revealing death dethroned.
Rose, a darkened world to bless,
Bringing up from mortal night,
Immortality and light.
Sacred be thine ev'ry hour!
Emblem, earnest of the rest
That remaineth for the blest!
How they loved and kept thee here,
To a temple in the skies,
Fair, eternal, they shall rise.
Shall mingle with their praises there;
Then their sweet reward shall be
An eternity of thee.
THE DEPARTING SPIRIT.
Be the dim chamber all silently trod!
Let not the tear, that is rounded, be dropt!
Oh! 't is a spirit returning to God!
Loosing its ties to the beautiful clay;
Lo! they have lifted their hovering wings:
Joyous they waft her in triumph away!
While on its features death's lilies unfold:
Break not the heart for another so warm,
Stopt in its pulse by a finger so cold.
Silken and full, round the forehead, that shines.
Age shall not come, nor the finger of care,
Marking that brow with their deep-going lines.
Anguish will never that bosom invade:
Tears roll no more from that calm sleeping eye:
Peace o'er the clay her smooth mantle has laid.
Tender and pure, where the dust shall repose.
Look then from earth, whence the bright spirit fled,
Up, where to gladness and glory it rose.
SONNET.
That harmless robin's breast!
Its downy vesture do not tear;
But leave the life-blood circling there,
Again to warm her nest;
For she is hastening home with food
Provided for her callow brood.
Were now thy shot to fly,
Left, as thy helpless babes would be,
'Reft of their mother and of thee,
To moan, and pine, and die.
Then let her pass unhurt along;
And she will thank thee with a song.
FATHER, HEAR!
Now, of this wild wintry storm,
Let it still in mercy be
Shown upon the raging sea!
O! for him, who tosses there,
Father, hear this midnight prayer!
While, with mighty wings unfurled,
Thus the winds in fury sweep
O'er the land, and o'er the deep,
Thou, whose thought from death can save,
Guard the life that 's on the wave!
Snow-clouds wrap the beacon-light;
Rocks and ices, like a host
Armed for battle, bar the coast;
For the coming bark appear!
Guide her! save her! Father, hear!
THE PILGRIM'S WAY SONG.
O draw not my feet from the way;
Nor stop me these wild flowers to gather!
They droop at my touch, and decay.
I think of the flowers, that are blooming
In beauty unfading above,
The wings of the angels perfuming,
Who fly down on errands of love.
Is powerless my thirst to allay;
Their taste is of tears, while we're sinking
Beside them, where quicksands betray.
I long, from that fount ever-living,
That flows by my Father's own door,
With waters so sweet and life-giving,
To drink, and to thrist never more.
Makes all lower gold to look dim;
Its treasures, all treasures excelling,
Shine forth to allure me to Him.
The pearls of this world while I'm treading
In dust, where as pebbles they lie,
I seek the rich pearl, that is shedding
Its lustre so pure from on high.
No balsam from earth it receives:
I go to the tree, that hath healing
To drop on my wounds from its leaves.
A child that is weary with roaming,
Returning in gladness to see
A home and a parent, I'm coming—
My Father, I hasten to thee!
THE RISING MONUMENT.
As well befits thy purpose and thy place:
Great Speaker! rise, not suddenly, to show
The earth forever sacred at thy base.
Proportioned fair, in altitude sublime,
With freedom's glory round thee as a robe,
Rise gently—then defy the power of time.
Speak in thy mighty eloquence, and tell
That where thou art, on Bunker's hallowed height,
Our Warren and his valiant brethren fell.
Purpling the turf, amid the mortal strife
For man's great birthright, from the breasts, that glowed
With love of country, more than love of life.
From patriot bosoms, set their spirits free:
All, who behold, shall venerate thy form,
And bow before thy genius, Liberty.
Who fought and died to break a people's chain:
Poured o'er the victims for a nation slain.
Turning to gems those holy drops of grief,
As after evening showers, the morn's clear beams
Show diamonds hung on grass, and flower and leaf.
That from thy native spot arose to God,
Stand thou and hold, long as our planet rolls,
This last high place by Freedom's martyrs trod.
Calm as the sun, and constant as his light;
And by the moon, amid the dews, be found
The sentinel, who guards it through the night.
To heaven-born Liberty as vital breath;
But, like the breeze that sweeps the Upas tree,
To Bondage and Oppression certain death!
City and dome, and spire look up to thee:
The solemn forest and the mountains gray
Stand distant to salute thy majesty.
While the bright shore beneath thy ken he laves,
Of freedom, with his never-conquered waves.
Above thee are about to pass away;
But, when the dead around thee are to rise,
Melt in the burning splendors of the day!
Who hath on earth a kingdom pure to save,
Come with his angels, calling up the slain
To freedom, and annihilate the grave.
A NAME IN THE SAND.
A pearly shell was in my hand:
I stooped, and wrote upon the sand
My name—the year—the day.
As onward from the spot I passed,
One lingering look behind I cast:
A wave came rolling high and fast,
And washed my lines away.
With every mark on earth from me;
A wave of dark oblivion's sea
Will sweep across the place,
Where I have trod the sandy shore
Of time, and been to be no more,
Of me—my day—the name I bore,
To leave nor track, nor trace.
And holds the waters in his hands,
I know a lasting record stands,
Inscribed against my name,
Of all, this mortal part has wrought;
Of all, this thinking soul has thought;
And from these fleeting moments caught
For glory, or for shame.
THE CHILD OF A YEAR AND A DAY
A mournful mother lay
Upon her pillow, weeping—
Her babe had passed away.
A year and yet a day,
Of time 't was all its measure—
'T was gone, like morning's ray!
Of worth surpassing gold,
Was lent her, by its Owner—
'T was never earth's to hold.
A bright young angel hung;
And warm the love it bore her,
And sweet the song it sung:
Let all thy sorrow cease:
My infant form is sleeping,
Where nought can break its peace.
Such little children here,
My spirit now possessing,
Will hold me ever dear.
Of death's all-conquering blow;
My mortal raiment shedding,
I rose above the foe.
Where comes nor grief nor night—
Where sin shall never stain me,
I dwell, a child of light.
Treads long earth's weary way,
I have eternal glory
For one short year and day.”
Its mother could not hear,
For grief her heart was wringing—
She 'd but a mortal ear.
Of his celestial crown;
For fast her tears were streaming;
Her soul to dust bowed down.
In soothing tones to her,
As of a Father, calling,
Revealed the Comforter.
And sorrow-laden eye,
She saw the King all holy
Upon the throne Most High.
Their praises forth to Him,
She saw her child adoring,
Amid the Seraphim.
THE BELIEVER'S MOUNTAINS.
Jehovah's face concealed,
When loud to wandering man he spoke,
To make his law revealed—
Not to the awful splendor there
Can turn my fearful eye:
To hear its thunderings, and to dare
Its lightnings, were to die.
The promised land to see
Across the waves of Jordan's flood,
Is yet the place for me.
My spirit could not bear to take
That fair and glorious view,
Nor dare her wondrous launch to make,
To try the waters through.
At once so heavenly bright;
While they, who heard the Father, feared,
And fell before the light—
Not there, my Saviour ever nigh,
Do I his footsteps trace:
His closer followers far, than I,
Attain that higher place.
Where Jesus sat and taught,
I daily would assert my claim,
To share the bread he brought.
His words before that multitude
Dropt to his chosen few,
Are manna for my morning food,
My soul's sweet evening dew.
That mount exceeding high,
My Lord, again rebuke our foe,
And bid the tempter fly.
No kingdom may I seek, but thine;
And let my glory be
A light, reflected pure from thine—
My portion, life with thee!
Of solitude and prayer,
Ascend, my soul, be not afraid
Thy Guide to follow there.
The height and stillness of the scene,
When thou that path hast trod,
Forbids this world to rush between
A spirit and her God.
And o'er the city wept—
Where fell his wo-wrung drops of blood,
While his disciples slept—
Till Jesus be betrayed;
But, as he went, to pray and weep
O'er sufferings sin hath made.
Where Christ received the cup
Of death, to offer us a fount
Of life, must I go up.
And I must look upon his wo,
On that empurpled tree,
To learn how vast a debt I owe,
By what he paid for me.
May I the way pursue,
With joy my risen Lord to see,
Ere he ascends from view.
For lo! the heavens their gates unfold
To take their coming King:
His angels harp on strings of gold,
And “Hallelujah!” sing.
My shield—my strong, high tower;
And thence, though here so dark and weak,
Be clothed with light and power.
Then at that holy mountain's top,
My soul, no more to roam,
Unfurl thy wings—thine ashes drop;
And gain thy glorious home.
THE NIGHT AND THE MORNING.
Nature astonished, shrouds herself in gloom;
For he, who was the babe of Bethlehem,
Is now a victim slain, and in the tomb!
That in the garden forced his swelling veins,
In crimson streams has poured on Calvary;
A rocky cavern holds his pale remains.
The meek, the merciful, through taunts and strife;
The front of pride he met with lowliness,
And bowed to death to lift his foes to life.
His bitter cup was filling to the brim.
Here doth he lie, the pale, the crucified,
With damps and shadows gathered over him.
While they, who came the sepulchre to keep
With bristling spears, the Roman soldiery,
Would fain resign their glittering arms for sleep.
Must keep his constant vigils round the spot
Where he shall find the watch of Israel:
The life, the spirit moves, and heeds him not.
O'er death and darkness, far from mortal sight,
Hath wrought the body bright and glorious
For resurrection by the morning light.
The guard behold, as comes the dawning day,
Her dubious gloom and dimness banishing,
The stone that barred the tomb is rolled away.
Which wraps the dead, lay, spiritless and cold,
Within the vault so still and shadowy,
That, as a prison-guard, they came to hold?
The sad habiliments of death, are here,
With burial odors round them hovering,
And white-robed angels calmly sitting near.
Where new-born lilies worship from their stalks;
And boughs with blossoms bend, embowering
The dewy pathway! there the Saviour walks.
While he is risen from the broken tomb;
As one his vines and fruit trees numbering,
He breathes the incense of their opening bloom.
Is not so mild, so heavenly fair as he.
The sun, just rising in the orient,
Hath less of glory than in him we see.
Hath put on darkness, as a mourning weed,
Arrayed in light as for a festival,
Proclaims afar, “The Lord is risen indeed!”
I SHALL BE SATISFIED.
And rise, a fair image of thee;
Then I shall be satisfied, when I can break
This prison of clay, and be free.
With thy perfect features to shine,
In raiment unsullied from time's dreary night,
What honor and joy will be mine!
The shadows of nature all by—
When, darkness and dust from the dull eyelid past,
My soul sees with full-opened eye.
When earth's dreamy visions shall fade,
If I in thy semblance indeed may appear,
And stand in thy beauty arrayed!
From this mortal, perishing clay
My spirit immortal, in peace would depart,
And, joyous, mount up her bright way.
In thy holy mansion, and when
Thy fatherly arms have encircled thy child,
O I shall be satisfied then!
THE PENITENTIAL TEAR.
What skill from ocean's depths can bring,
Or toil from out the mine—
What monarch in his diadem,
Or glittering garb, produce a gem,
Whose brightness equals thine?
Of riven rock, or opening waves,
Invisible as air:
And, though the angel throng above
Behold thee with delight and love,
They ne'er can have thee there.
Thou 'rt now unstained as when with him,
Who dared, in olden time,
Thrice his dear, suffering Lord deny;
Then, melted at the Saviour's eye,
And paid thee for his crime.
By power divine, when thou dost roll
Forth from the mourner's eye,
Thy wearer thou dost then proclaim
The heir of life, who has his name
Writ in the Book on high.
And when thy matchless worth is known
To those, who wear thee here,
They will be changed, and shall behold
The shining gates of heaven unfold,
Bright Penitential Tear!
TEACHINGS OF GOD.
In ocean, earth, and air;
He moves and governs every thing,
For God is every where.
The mountain and its flower
Their majesty and beauty show,
As traces of his power.
Are leaning on his hand;
And so the cedar of the hills,
The palm and olive stand.
On light and brilliant wing;
And tuned them with the voice of song
And joy his praise to sing.
From him, who made it thus—
Who sends his angels down with care
To minister to us.
A pledge to man, is lent
By him, who spreads the shining skies
Around him, “as a tent.”
Yon radiant sun above
Is but an image, cold and dim,
Of his great power and love.
In splendor there to roll,
To warm the world, to light the eye;
He lights and warms the soul.
That azure vault should mar,
He moved his finger there, and made,
At every touch, a star.
Here lets her lustre fall,
Our thoughts to win, our hearts to lift
To him, who gave them all.
Our Father, Guide, and Friend;
In ways untravelled by the sun,
In love that ne'er shall end.
With his approving eye
To mark the way, our spirits go
To seek his face on high.
THE HERALD'S CRY IN THE DESERT.
“He was not that Light; but was sent to bear witness of that Light.”
St. John i. 8.The slumber of death from your eyes,
Behold the fair morn in its breaking,
The Sun of all glory arise.
The shadows and clouds flee away:
Ho! all, that in darkness are dwelling,
Spring up, and rejoice in the day!
He'll show you to fountain and streams:
Ye wounded, for you he brings healing;
Come out and repose in his beams.
Your King in his beauty and might;
His raiment mount Ebal is veiling;
Mount Gerizim shines with his light.
To feel your hard burdens unbound!
Ye captives, your bars fall asunder;
With shoutings leap forth at the sound.
They 're set as the seal of his ring;
Ye nations, your highways preparing,
Receive, and be glad in your King!
OUR FATHER'S WELL.
And, by our father's well,
Sit down beside each other,
Life's little dreams to tell.
In childhood's sunny hours;
Before life's stormy weather
Had killed its morning flowers.
Its weary journey through,
As we so far have hasted,
Like that our father drew;
I cannot pass nor climb,
Till from that distant fountain
I drink, as in my prime.
No waters else can quell;
My heart seems near to bursting
To reach that good old well.
And though so changed are we,
Just where our father found it,
That pure well spring will be.
He reached and smote the rock;
He set its fount to flowing—
It opened at his knock.
A close, round, shadowy cell;
Whoever since has owned it,
It is our father's well!
With each an infant's cup,
We waited for the water,
His steady hand drew up.
Till down the bucket dashed,
O how it, rising, glistened,
And to the sunlight flashed!
Has that cool deep been dry;
Its fount is living ever,
While man and seasons die.
The moss of many a year;
But from its heart is flowing
The water sweet and clear.
And, like a happy child,
She plucks, with busy fingers,
And wreathes the roses wild.
Its limpid drops allayed,
Has since, to ashes turning,
Been veiled in silent shade.
About our infant play;
Where that free spring is welling,
So true, and far away.
Our father's head is hoar;
The tender name of mother
Is ours to call no more.
Such little ones as we
Were then, beside our father,
And look to theirs in thee.
Their numbers none can tell;
So let us hence be hasting
To find our Father's well.
And from its mossy brink,
To flowers that ne'er shall wither
Look up to heaven and drink.
Our Father there will give
To all his sons and daughters,
Where they shall drink and live.
THE MOTHER'S DREAM.
Rev. ii. 28.
My beautiful boy had come:
My sorrow was gone, my cheek was dry,
And gladness around my home.
All kindled with life he came;
And he spake in his own sweet voice, and smiled,
As soon as I called his name.
As the feathery snow comes down,
And warm, as it shone in the softened light
That fell from his dazzling crown.
His cheek with a deathless bloom,
That only the eye of my soul hath seen,
When looking beyond the tomb.
Where we deem that our blest ones are,
Seemed borne in his skirts; and his soft right hand
Was holding a radiant star.
As the lily's opening bell,
Half veiled in a cloud of glory, as there
Around him, in folds, it fell.
Who circled his head with light—
And whence he returned to meet my view
So calm and heavenly bright.
Away from his mother's care—
Again to sing me his infant song,
And to kneel by my side in prayer.
Is not for an earthly ear:
I touch the harp with a golden string,
For the hosts of heaven to hear.
That severed thy child from thee!
The fearful shadow, in time, called Death,
Hath ministered life to me.
And high are the notes we raise:
I hold the sign of a priceless gift,
And the Giver, who hath our praise.
Who bringeth eternal day!
And, mother, he giveth himself to thee,
To lighten thine earthly way.
And He is never afar,
Who saith of the wise, untiring soul,
‘I will give him the morning star!’
And pure to its crystal top;
For Faith, with a steady eye, distilled
And numbered every drop.
And my heart to rise in prayer,
I learned the way to a world above;
The home of thy child is there!
That only thy God hath known,
Arose, like sweet incense, holy and free,
And gathered around his throne.
To shed upon this world's air,
As I joyful knelt, at my Saviour's feet,
For the glorious crown I wear.
The waters of life I drink:
Behold my feet, as they 've pressed the flowers,
That grow by the fountain's brink!
There 's nothing of chill, or blight,
Or sighing to blend with the balmy air—
No sorrow—no pain—no night!”
And the lovely illusion broke!
My rapture had banished my beauteous boy—
To a shadowy void I spoke.
With light to direct my feet
Where, when I have done with my earthly dreams,
The mother and child may meet.
THE WAR-SPIRIT ON BUNKER'S HEIGHT.
O'er earth full of promise, and air full of tune;
The broad azure streams calmly rolled to the deep,
Whose waves on its breast stirred like babes in their sleep.
That fed, or reposed in the shade of the rock;
The birds sang their songs by their nests in the bowers;
And the bee hummed with sweets from the fresh opened flowers.
Where her nectar was stored, from the hill to the dell;
'Mid the bloom and the perfume, that passed on the breeze,
From the rose, and the vine, and the fruit-bearing trees.
In festival robes, with her treasures displayed,
Reflected the smile of her Maker above,
And offered up hymns of her thanksgiving love.
Fierce, quenchless and fearful—consuming desires
For right unpossessed, and for lawless domain,
That burned to the soul, and that flamed to the brain.
In the dwellings, resolve, preparation, alarms;
In the eye of the wife, mother, sister, a tear;
In the face of their soldier, no semblance of fear.
To hold, or to fall, if his foe passed the bound:
And now was the hero to close in the strife,
For death as a bondman, or freedom with life.
His eye flashing lightning—his wings shedding night!
From his wide fiery nostrils rolled volumes of smoke,
And the rocks roared afar, as in thunder he spoke.
The bee and the bird, in affright fled away;
The branch, flower, and grass, felt the crush and the scath,
And the winds passing by, snuffed the heat of his wrath.
He drenched the green turf, that he strewed with the slain,
Till the eminence groaned with the carnage it bore,
And its heart heaved and shuddered at drinking the gore.
The rivers looked wild in reflecting his glare;
And ocean's cold bosom was torn, as he gave
The flap of his pinion to trouble its wave.
Looked up to the hill, where he revelled with death,
And swelled with the essence of life he had shed,
To sweeten their cup, and the banquet to spread.
Such trophies of beauty before the pale king,
Since walking on Gilboa's height, in thy power,
Of Israel's valiant to mow down the flower?
Whose deep sable fringe down the hill-sides shall fall!
Your brethren's warm blood cries aloud from the ground,
That hosts, like Philistia's, in triumph surround.
Where they fell may there hence be no dew on the grass!
Let a monument there, towards the heavens rear its head,
From a base, that shall cover the spot where they bled!
Though heaven was unclouded, and earth all in bloom,
When thou, at the onset, that young summer's day,
Didst strike so much valor to darkness away!
'Twas the crack of her yoke when beginning to break!
And out of that gloom is her glory to spread;
Her living be franchised, immortal her dead.
To breast the thick clouds, till he sails the blue skies;
And drop, while he bathes at the fountain of light,
A plume from his pinion their story to write.
Full and warm with the sunbeams their deeds to record;
And move o'er the scroll in the hand of the free,
While the wing where it grew spans the earth and the sea.
THE INNER SELF.
Close wrapped in shade and silence deep,
And starry hosts and angels keep
Their vigils o'er the night,
I have a curious work to do,
A secret door to venture through,
A wondrous being then to view;
If I can stand the sight.
Unlock my breast, and pass to see
The inmost, true, essential ME:
And lo! I here have found,
Enclosed within its shrine, the heart,
Myself, my thinking, reasoning part:
But say, my spirit, what thou art,
And whence, and whither bound!
And shrinking, that I thus draw near
The majesty, that meets me here,
My soul, unveiled, in thee!
I cannot give thy form, or hue,
Or measure, or proportions true;
But feel myself myself subdue,
Thou deepening mystery.
Could furnish food to nourish thee;
Nor welling founts, nor rivers free,
The spirit's thirst allay:
Nor silver web, nor cloth of gold,
Nor stuffs, that time can e'er unfold,
Nor pearls, nor gems this world may hold,
Compose thee an array.
Own that from thee their feeling came;
And, at the slightest touch, will claim
Thy closest sympathy.
Thou art their life, their light, their spring,
Informing them in every thing,
But how they are allied, and cling,
My nobler self, to thee.
Whom all my meaner powers obey?
Hand, foot and tongue and eye—are they
The servants of thy will?
And when they pause, repose to take,
Dost thou, untiring and awake,
Thy pinions spread, and swiftly make
Thy wide excursions still?
To stretch thy wings from pole to pole—
To span the globe—to mark its roll—
Its elements to see,
Its end to come before thine eye,
Whilst thou canst fire and flood defy,
Nor ever cease to be?
Or arrows dart, dost thou arise
Through air and space, and scale the skies,
'Mid shining spheres to roam:
And with thy conscious rank elate,
Dost stand and watch at heaven's bright gate,
For glimpses of that rich estate
Where thou may'st claim thy home.
To spy the difference 'twixt the crown
Of life, and that dread withering frown,
Which blights a spirit there.
Then, on eternity's dark brink,
Between them dost thou pause, and think,
And ask, if thou shalt soar or sink—
To joy or wo the heir.
Too small my nobler part to span,
I end my quest where it began,
And from myself retire.
I hence must own within my breast
A power of unknown powers possessed—
A flame, not long to be repressed,
Of clear immortal fire.
TIME.
Giving whate'er we fondly count as ours;
Life, love, hope, faith, the sun, the stars and flowers;
All that to man is dear to thee we owe!
Yet does he call thee, slayer, robber, thief,
And stern, as of his foes thou wert the chief,
Filling his path with ruins, pain and grief,
Without one tender blessing to bestow!
Hast given maturity, as well as prime,
To all her works, in every age and clime,
Since the first floweret on her bosom grew.
Light from the darkness doth thy hand unfold
Beauty from dust we in thy deeds behold:
The frail, the dimmed, the withered, worn and old
Thy breath dissolves, that they may shine anew.
Again she rises fairer for the fall.
Thou beckonest back the flood! and at thy call,
From crust-capped mounts, volcanic splendors pour.
The absent sun his way to morning bends;
The waning star to thy command attends,
Fills out and burns; and man to dust descends,
In hope to live, when thou shalt be no more.
Shall have them brought, in verdure, back by thee;
The flower has vanished, but the trusting bee
Will find her cell again with sweetness stored.
The seed may perish, yet the germ will rise;
The grain is ripened while its sheathing dies.
The fruits of earth, the glories of the skies
Forth by thy bounteous hand to man are poured.
The key to joys it never can be thine
To give or take; and heavenly light to shine
When we must enter that dark, shadowy vale.
Where nought of earth the pathway can illume,
Or lend one ray to shoot across the gloom,
That gathers round the threshold of the tomb,
When thou must there, first and forever, fail.
Owes all he is, and all he hopes to be,
When thou and he are severed, but to thee?
Why does he slay thee piecemeal, day by day?
Shut out in exile from thine empire, there,
In that unknown, dread, boundless country, where
Is no retreat, no inn, how will he bear
To have thy spectre haunt the endless way?
And his relations to thee from his birth;
To bring his course o'er this uneven earth,
Then, as a weary traveller is undressed,
While gently thou the spirit may'st divest
Of her worn garment, there remains a rest,
And she goes franchised to that blest repose.
Of thine is gone, thou hast another here!
Grateful we hail it, though the bitter tear
May have put out the light of joy that shone
On many a face; though tender, sundered ties
Have changed to chords that vibrate but with sighs,
In many a stricken breast where sorrow lies,
Draining the life-stream, while that year has flown.
And seeming evils, turned and viewed aright,
May prove but passing clouds, and lined with light.
Our trust, deceived in earthly things, may teach
The restless, eager spirit to forego
Her crushing grasp on hollow hopes, that grow
Like fragile reeds, to mock her hold below;
And after higher, holier joys to reach.
Since few, and short, and fleeting are our days;
And since, so peaceful are her pleasant ways,
So that, when thou hast safely led us through
Thy kingdom, with a brighter land in view,
Calm at thy bourn, and with a kind adieu,
We may, as friends, shake hands with thee and part.
MY HEAD.
Strange revolutions of my farm and me.”
Dryden's Virgil.
I never, never thought to see;
When all, with fingers and a thumb,
May to thy chambers have a key!
To come beneath the learned touch,
And let the judge in judgment sit
Upon thy bumps, that prove so much.
Their own contents, at will, be shown;
I never thought mankind could get
An outward way to make them known.
The matter short, and all may tell
Thy value, as they 'd prize a nut,
And know the kernel by the shell.
On heads, were only poured within,
Thou wouldst not thus be left to own
The darkness that is now thy sin.
Of purely phrenologic light,
Thou, wildered thing, art in a maze,
And destitute of faith and sight.
Thou couldst not utter or define,
Of which, to tell the truth, three thirds
Were gravel, in a mouth like thine.
To show the powers of living brains:
'T is just like feeling of the hull,
To tell what goods the ship contains.
Have raised the bump, 't is all the same;
The sage's crown, or dunce's cap
Must be awarded as its claim.
And manage with such ease and grace,
I dare not try with rein or bit,
It seems so of the donkey race.
A fault of thine, a want of sight,
That so much said by Combe and Gall
And Spurzheim cannot turn thee right.
If thou art hollow, or opaque;
I only know thou canst not see,
And faith declines one step to take.
Depriving thee of every sense;
So now, if tried, thou must be dumb,
Nor say one word in self-defence!
THE WHEAT FIELD.
Shining, with thy sunny hair
Lightly waving either way,
Graceful as the breezes play—
Looking like a summer sea;
How I love to gaze at thee!
Pleasant art thou to the sight;
And to thought a rich delight.
Then, thy voice is music sweet,
Softly sighing field of wheat.
Rising straight, and aiming high,
Every stalk is seen to shoot
As an arrow, from the root.
Like a well-trained company,
All in uniform agree,
From the footing to the ear;
All in order strict appear.
Marshalled by a skilful hand,
All together bow, or stand
Still, within the proper bound:
None o'ersteps the given ground,
With its tribute held to pay,
At his nod whom they obey,
Each the gems, that stud its crown,
Will ere long, for man, lay down.
Of the precious sheaves of wheat.
Not a robber bird, that flies,
Finds support whereby to put
On a stalk her lawless foot.
Not a predatory beak
Plunges down, thy stores to seek,
Where the guard of silver spears
Keeps the fruit, and decks the ears.
No vain insect, that could do
Harm to thee, dares venture through
Such an armory, or eat
Off the sheath to take the wheat.
Opened here for eye and mind!
In it who can offer less,
Than to wonder, and confess,
That on this high-favored ground,
Faith is blest, and hope is crowned.
Charity her arms may spread
Wide from it, with gifts of bread.
Wisdom, power, and goodness meet
In the bounteous field of wheat.
THE LITTLE TRAVELLER.
But still, I would like to be known to fame,
Though next to nothing I had my birth,
And lowest of all is my lowly name.
I this can say, in family pride,
That I'm of the world's most numerous race,
And made by the Maker of all beside.
Still I'm so little I can't be lost:
I journey about wherever I choose,
And those, who carry me, bear the cost.
I often cling to my deadly foe;
And, spite of the cruelest flirts and flings,
Arise by the force that has cast me low.
I 've quietly risen her face to seek,
Embraced her forehead, or calmly put
Myself to rest in her dimpled cheek.
But startled, and sprung at the wild affray,
The sights of horror, of fire and fume,
And fled on the wing of the winds away.
By the proudest guest of the stately scene;
I 've touched his majesty's bosom-pin,
And the nuptial ring of his lofty queen.
I 've oft been one familiar and free:
The fairest lady has smiled, and laid
Her delicate, gloveless hand on me.
Never declines a call from me;
And all, of every rank and age,
Admit me into their coterie.
If human, or brute, and can testify
To what they do, to what they wear,
To wonders none ever beheld but I!
Forgetting my name, my rank and birth,
I begin to think I am number one
Of the great and manifold things of earth.
Which modesty bids me here withhold;
For fear with my travels I seem to swell,
Or grow, for an ATOM OF DUST, too bold!
THE ENTANGLED FLY.
Poor, silly fly,
Caught in the spider's web,
Hung there to die!
What could have tempted thee?
What led thee there,
For thy foe, thus to throw
Around thee the snare?
Ne'er can unweave
From thee the silken threads,
Laid to deceive.
Sorrow for wandering
Comes now in vain;
And, with one thus undone,
Grief adds to pain.
Unwary thing!
Thou may'st again be off,
High on the wing,
If thou wilt promise me,
Hence to be found
Never more, as before,
On evil ground.
Skilled to ensnare:
He is a wily one;
Think, and beware.
Down to his dusky ways
No more descend!
Little fly, thou and I
Both want a friend.
Whose snare is laid
Softly and silently,
Deep in the shade.
Light, by the tempter shunned,
Only can show
Where, secure, free, and pure,
Our feet may go.
THE PEACH BLOSSOMS.
What fair, ripe peaches there are on the tree—
On the very same bough that was given to me
By father, one day last spring.
When it looked so beautiful, all in the blow,
And I wanted to pluck it, he told me, you know,
I might, but that waiting a few months would show
The fruit, that patience might bring.
And the look of his eye, it was clearly his choice
That it should not be touched, I have now to rejoice
That I told him we 'd let it remain;
For, had it been gathered when full in the flower,
Its blossoms had withered, perhaps, in an hour,
And nothing on earth could have given the power
That would make them flourish again.
I 've enough for myself and my playmates a treat;
And they tell me, besides, that the kernels secrete
What, if planted, will make other trees:
For the shell will come open to let down the root;
A sprout will spring up, whence the branches will shoot;
There'll be buds, leaves, and blossoms; and then comes the fruit—
Such beautiful peaches as these!
Has a wheel in a wheel, which, if aught comes between,
It ruins her work, as it might have been seen,
Had it not given patience this trial.
From this, I'll be careful to keep it in mind,
When the blossoms I love, that there lingers behind
A better reward, that the trusting shall find
For a trifling self-denial.
THE BROKEN PIPE.
Why, what is the trouble?
“I 've broke my new pipe, ma'—
I can't make a bubble!”
But brighten your face,
And tell how the grievous
Disaster took place.
And, said I, ‘Now she'll think
That white, frothy water
Is milk she may drink.’
And plunged her mouth in,
When up came both paws,
And clung fast to my chin.
With my pipe; and it flew
At once into pieces!
O what shall I do?
I wish naughty Kit
Had been a mile off:
See! there 's blood on me yet!”
Your loss is but just;
You first deceived Pussy,
And trifled with trust.
You compelled her; and thence
The wound on your face,
From poor Kit's self-defence.
And beat her, you know
Your pipe and yourself
Fared the worst for the blow.
Hence never to stoop
To make man, or brute,
That may trust you, a dupe.
It should not be abused,
Oppressing the weaker,
Nor strength be misused.
Returns whence it came;
And ever deceit must
Be followed by shame.
And here end your sorrow;
I'll buy you a pipe,
To blow bubbles, to-morrow.
VIVY VAIN.
Too fond of gay clothing; and so,
She 'd gad about town
Just to show a new gown,
As a train-band their color to show.
Whene'er she obtained a new hat,
With pride in her air,
She 'd go round, here and there,
For all whom she knew to see that.
More highly she valued fine looks,
Than virtue, or truth,
Or devoting her youth
To usefulness, friendship, or books.
And therefore, it happened one day,
Arrayed in bright hues,
And with new hat and shoes,
Miss Vain walked abroad for display.
To cause but aversion in those,
Who saw how she'd prinked,
And to bystanders winked,
While the boys cried, “Halloo! there she goes!”
She came near a pool, and a green
With fence close and high;
And, as Vivy drew nigh,
A donkey stood near it unseen.
The moment she came by his place;
And gave a loud bray
In her ear, when, away
She sprang, shrieked, and fell on her face.
Awhile upon earth lying flat;
And the terrible sound
Seemed to furrow the ground,
She embraced in her fine gown and hat.
Yet heeded not whither or whence,
To flee from the roar,
That continued to pour
Behind her, from over the fence.
She slipped and rolled down to its brim;
The geese gave a shout,
And at length hissed her out
Of the bounds, where they 'd gathered to swim.
Abruptly, the horns of a cow
That mooed, while the cur,
At her heels, turned from her,
And aimed at Miss Vain his “bow-wow.”
As she flew, flirted high on the wind;
The children at play,
Paused to see one so gay,
And all in a flutter behind.
Said they, “So it seems, that to-day,
Miss Vain carries marks
At which the dog barks,
And that make sober Long-Ears to bray.”
Poor Vivy approached her own door,
She went, swift and straight
As a dart, through the gate,
Abhorring the gay gear she wore.
With humiliation and tears:
The words, and the noise
Of the brutes and the boys
Were echoing still in her ears.
Resolving that cause to remove;
And thence, her desire
Was for modest attire,
And her heart and her mind to improve.
Remarked on the change and the gain
In mind, and in mien,
And in dress, that were seen
In the once flashy Miss Vivy Vain.
THE MOCKING BIRD.
In a bushy, blooming tree,
Imbosomed by the foliage and flower.
And there he sat and sang,
Till all around him rang,
With sounds, from out the merry mimic's bower.
Piped, chattered, shrieked, and hissed;
He then would moan, and whistle, quack, and caw;
Then, carol, drawl, and croak,
As if he 'd pass a joke
On every other winged one he saw.
A gay and plaintive snatch,
And mingle notes of half the feathered throng.
For well the mocker knew,
Of every thing that flew,
To imitate the manner and the song.
And paused awhile to hear
How well he gave their voices and their airs.
And some became amused;
While some, disturbed, refused
To own the sounds that others said were theirs.
To find their honors mocked
By one so pert and voluble as he;
They knew not if 't was done
In earnest or in fun;
And fluttered off in silence from the tree.
To think a song or strain
Of theirs, however weak, or loud, or hoarse,
Was worthy to be heard
Repeated by the bird;
For of his wit they could not feel the force.
“Poor fellow! if his head
Is turned, or cracked, or has no talent left;
But feels the want of powers,
And plumes itself from ours,
Why, we shall not be losers by the theft.”
It seems, would mimic us,
And steal our songs, to pass them for his own!
But if he only quotes
In honor of our notes,
We then were quite as honored, let alone.”
Or friend, we still may know
So, let us not be moved,
Since first to be improved
By every thing, becomes the truly wise.”
THE BIRD'S HOME.
With the song, and the bright, glossy plume?
“I'll tell thee where I rest,
If thou wilt not rob my nest;—
I built among the sweet apple bloom.”
What 's there, in the snug, downy cell?
“If thou wilt not rob the tree;
Nor go too near, to see
My quiet little home, I will tell.”
But closely thy secret I will keep.
“I 've three little tender things,
That have never used their wings!
I left them there, at home, fast asleep.”
Away from thy young, helpless brood?
“To pay thee with a song,
Just to let me pass along,
Nor harm me, as I look for their food!”
THE BIRD UNCAGED.
A bright little bird, as a short adieu
It hastily whistled, and passed the door,
And felt that its sorrowful hours were o'er.
To utter its joy for an outspread wing,—
That now it could sport in the boundless air,
And might go any and every where.
But her eye was wet, as she marked its flight;
Till, this was the song that she seemed to hear;
And, merrily warbled, it dried the tear:
In all, but keeping her bird confined;
She ministered food and drink to me,
But, O I was pining for liberty!
While the heart within it, she could not soothe:
I sickened and longed for the wildwood breeze,
My feathery kindred, and fresh green trees.
I looked with sorrow on every thing;
And mourned in silence, the whole day long.
And sing, when the cherries are round and ripe;
On the topmost bough, as I lock my feet,
To help myself, in my leafy seat.
To draw her eye to her franchised bird;
The burden, then, of my song shall be,
‘Earth for the wingless! but air for me!’”
DAME BIDDY.
Because it so chanced, that dame Biddy
Had round her a family group
Of chicks, young, and helpless and giddy.
She fancied the life of a ranger;
And led off her brood, far from home,
To fall into mischief or danger.
And call all her children to follow;
And scratch up the seeds that were sown,
Then, lie in their places and wallow.
Its first little blade had been shooting,
And try, by the strength of her bill,
To learn if the kernel was rooting.
Of pleasure, through thicket and brambles,
The covetous eye of a hawk
Delighted in marking her rambles.
“A prize of which I'll be the winner!”
So down would he pounce on his prey,
And bear off a chicken for dinner.
The cry of her youngling in dying,
Would scream at the merciless bird,
That high with his booty was flying.
Nor grief her lost darling recover.
She now had a chicken the less,
For acting the part of a rover.
And flying one way and another,
That still her dear child might have worn,
Had she been more wise as a mother.
Dame Biddy a little subjection;
And cooped her up, out of the reach
Of hawking, with time for reflection.
Of brush-wood that near her was lying,
He hoped to its meshes to wile
The fowler, that o'er her was flying.
And having a taste to renew it,
Sailed round near the coop, high in air,
With cruel intention, to view it.
If you love my chickens so dearly,
Come down to my yard for a walk,
That you may address them more nearly.”
Of Biddy, “my circuit is higher!
If I to his premises go,
'T will be when I see he 's not nigh her.”
The chickens the brush to run under,
And left them, while Hawk growing bold,
Thus tempted, came near for his plunder.
With appetite stronger and stronger,
He found he 'd but one thing to do,
And plunged, to defer it no longer.
At once in the net-work entangled,
While through it his head and his claws
In hopeless vacuity dangled.
Where they for their barley had huddled;
And all in a flutter they fled,
And soon through the coop holes had scuddled.
He saw the bold captive was in it;
And said, “If this play be unfair,
Remember, I did not begin it!”
The airy assassin disarming,
Unspurred him, and rendered him weak,
By blunting each talent for harming.
The chickens hid under their mother,
For he, by his feathers was known
As he, who had murdered their brother.
Determined to show him no quarter,
In action gave vent to her spite;
As motherly tenderness taught her.
Attacked the poor captive unfriended;
And you, (who have witnessed a hen
In anger,) may guess how it ended.
If pecking and scratching could do it,
Till, sinking in silent distress,
He perished before she got through it.
A thought like approving the fury,
That gave, in this summary way,
Punition, without judge or jury.
To lessen the angry bestower;
The fowl that inflicts it, descends—
The featherless biped, still lower.
THE ENVIOUS LOBSTER.
And saw another, just the same
In form and size; but gayly clad
In scarlet clothing; while she had
No other raiment to her back
Than her old suit of greenish black.
Your dress was yesterday like mine;
And in the mud below the sea,
You lived, a crawling thing, like me.
But now, because you 've come ashore,
You 've grown so proud, that what you wore—
Your strong old suit of bottle-green,
You think improper to be seen.
To tell the truth, I don 't see why
You should be better dressed than I.
And I should like a suit of red
As bright as yours, from feet to head.
I think I'm quite as good as you,
And might be clothed in scarlet, too.”
“To be arrayed in glowing red?
Come here, my discontented miss,
And hear the scalding kettle hiss!
Will you go in, and there be boiled,
To have your dress, so old and soiled,
“Yes,” cried the lobster, “that I'll do,
And twice as much, if needs must be,
To be as gayly clad as she.”
Then, in she made a fatal dive,
And never more was seen alive!
Of one as fond of dress and show
As that vain lobster, and withal
As envious, you'll perhaps recall
To mind her folly, and the plight
In which she reappeared to sight.
She had obtained a bright array,
But for it, thrown herself away!
Her life and death were best untold,
But for the moral they unfold!
KIT WITH THE ROSE.
When kit came frolicking by;
So up went her feet on the window-seat,
To a rose, that had caught her eye.
Beneath her ominous paw;
And while it shook, with a threatening look
She coveted what she saw.
If I could but give it a snap,
Now all are out, nor thinking about
Their rose, or the least mishap!”
And, seizing the flower it bore
With the timely aid of her teeth, she made
A leap to the parlor floor.
All fresh in its morning bloom,
Till shattered and rent, its leaves were sent
To every side of the room.
She laid herself down to sun,
Inclining to doze, forgetting the rose
And the mischief she had done.
And uttered a piteous cry,
When she saw the fate of what had so late
Delighted her watchful eye.
Concealing his guilty face?
She had not a clue whereby to pursue
The rogue to his lurking-place.
And none will suspect it was I.”
For the puss awoke, when her mistress spoke,
And she well understood the cry.
Kit's mouth confessed the whole truth:
It opened so wide, that her mistress spied
A rose-leaf pierced by her tooth.
All covered with shame. And those
Inclined, like her, in secret to err,
Should remember kit with the rose.
THE STORM IN THE FOREST.
While tree after tree bows its stately green head;
The flowerets beneath them are bending and weeping;
And leaves, torn and trembling, all round them are spread.
Dismayed, hastens back to her home in the wood;
And flags not a wing, till her bosom, affrighted,
Has laid its warm down o'er her own little brood.
To shelter their heads from the rain and the blast,
Shall fearless repose, while the bolts burst around them;
And lie calm and safe, till the darkness is past.
And rending thy covert, or shaking thy rest,
Thine own blessed angel that moment the nearest—
Thy screen in his pinion—thy shield in his breast?
Till each prop of earth seemed to bend, or to break,
Did e'er thy good angel turn off, and forget thee?
The mother her little ones, then, may forsake!
The sun, in returning, more cheering and warm;
And all things around thee, seem fresher and purer,
And touched with new glory, because of the storm!
THE UPROOTED ELM.
A fatal change is past on thee!
And now thine aged form I see,
All helpless, lying low:
The rending tempest, in its flight
'Mid darkness of the wintry night,
Hath struck thee, passing in its might,
And felled thee at a blow.
Shall to thy boughs rich verdure bring,
Or her gay birds, to flit and sing
Where their first plumage grew;
For thou, so long, so fondly made
My eye's delight, my summer shade,
Here, as a lifeless king, art laid
In state, for all to view.
Defined on that cold, snow-white bed,
And those old arms, so widely spread,
Thy hopelessness declare:
Thy roots, in earth concealed so long—
That struck so deep, with hold so strong,
Upturned with many a broken prong,
Are quivering high in air.
With lofty front, with aspect grand,
Where thou hadst braved the ruthless hand
Of time, and spread, and towered;
And stood the rain, the hail, the blast,
Till more than hundred years had passed:
To fall so suddenly at last,
Forever overpowered!
What now thou art, and wast before,
Were sighs to rise, and tears to pour,
Like summer winds and rain;
Not all the sighs and drops of grief
Could bring to thee one bud or leaf;
Thou liest so like a stricken chief,
By one swift arrow slain.
Of what the spoiler's hand shall do
With one, who pensive here would view
A shadowy type in thee!
Let not the conqueror piecemeal slay,
With power by power in slow decay;
But strike, and all in ashes lay!
Farewell, my good old tree!
THROUGH THE CLOUDS.
Come, O sun, and sweetly smile!
Show thy glory to mine eye,
So my heart may beam the while.
For the world is sadly dim.
To thy blessed face of light
Let my spirit sing her hymn.
I, to pass the heavy hour,
Sit and fancy nature's moan
After thy reviving power.
Asking where thy face can be,
Chill and cheerless, every where,
Sighing, wailing, seek for thee.
Bud and flower look pale with grief.
Sick, the plant has hung its head;
Dulness weighs on every leaf.
Reft of thine inspiring ray,
As a lyre of every string,
Each from sight is hid away.
Of the skies, their shadows throw
Here, until their sombre hue
Gives a cast to all below.
Let thy beaming vesture fall!
Bringing music, joy and bloom,
Spread thy mantle o'er us all.
What were beauteous, bright, or dear,
Wert thou not so true above,
And thy holy influence here?
MY ROSE TREE.
Often have I longed to know
How thy tender leaves were moulded—
How thy buds are burst, and blow.
And have watched thee many an hour,
Yet I never could discover
How a bud becomes a flower.
On my pillow, till, at last,
I was gone in quiet slumber;
And a dream before me passed.
Stripped of flower, and bud and leaf;
While thy naked stalk and branches
Filled me with surprise and grief.
Spoiled of all that made thee dear,
Till a band of smiling angels
Mildly shining, hovered near.
All in silence, one of them
Laid his soft, fair fingers on thee,
Pulling leaves from out the stem.
With a dress of foliage green;
While another angel followed,
Bringing buds the leaves between.
He their silken rolls unsheathed,
While the one who tints the roses,
Through their loosened foldings breathed,
Filled each golden-bottomed cell,
Till, between the parting petals,
Free on air the fragrance fell.
Quick the angels passed from sight;
Leaving, where aloft they vanished,
But a stream of fading light.
And their voices far above,
Dying in the azure distance,
Naming thee a gift of love.
Finished thus by angel hands;
Perfect in its bloom and fragrance,
Beautiful, as now it stands.
I shall think of angels too;
And the countless works of goodness
They descend on earth to do.
They their careful watches keep;
Whether we may wake, or slumber,
Guardian angels never sleep!
THE INFANT BAPTIST.
And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, and was in the deserts until the day of his showing unto Israel.
Luke i. 80.Passing life's bright morning hours—
Playing in the silver rills,
Where they bathe Judea's hills—
Looking, with an earnest eye,
At the wild bird flitting by—
Infant of the joyous heart,
Canst thou tell me who thou art?
Hurls the clustered grapes away;
While thou lov'st to watch the bee,
Or to win a lamb to thee,
And to see the fleecy flock
Resting by the shadowy rock,—
Know'st thou, tender, beauteous boy,
What 's thine errand—whence thy joy?
By the altar, while the smoke
From thy father's incense rolled,
When thy being was foretold!
Thou art come, the promised one,
As the dayspring to the sun,
Through the realms of death and night!
Marked upon thy peaceful brow:
God's own Spirit filleth thee,
Sainted babe; for thou art he,
Who before the Lamb shall go,
Crying, that the world may know
He hath life to give the dead,
In the blood he comes to shed!
Come thy raiment, rest, and food,
Nightly o'er thy desert sleep,
Angels shall their vigils keep;
Through the wilderness by day,
They will guard and lead the way;
Till to Israel thou appear,
Showing heaven's mild kingdom near.
For thine eye, and hand, and heart!
When thy feet, on Jordan's side,
Feel the waters, as they glide,
Thou the Son of God shalt see,
Come to be baptized of thee—
Hear him named, and see the Dove
Resting on him from above!
HYMN TO SOLITUDE.
From tumult and crowds breaking free,
I fly, sick and sad, for the balm
I find given only by thee.
Kind guardian, friend of my soul,—
And then bring an earth-wounded heart
For thee to bind up and make whole.
Her wings in thy bosom hath furled,
To sink, as a bird in its nest,
Away from a cold, faithless world!
That o'er me its visions have cast,
I here would lie lowly and still,
Till sorrow's dark night hours are past.
To mount, as the lark from her sod;
And sing, as the morn of my skies
Appears in the smile of my God.
Whilst thus in thy bosom I lie,
Earth's baubles are under my feet—
My heart and its treasure, on high.
THE BIBLE IN THE FIELDS.
In summer's balmy hours,
To study it beside the brook,
Or by the trees and flowers.
Who made this world so fair,
The skies—the stream—the grassy sod
And bloom, that scents the air.
Of him, who feeds them all,—
Who lifts the towering eagle's wing,
And marks the sparrow's fall.
To speak his goodness too,
Presents its tender, purple head
Baptized with silvery dew.
As she comes swiftly by,
And seems to ask, if she should do
More work, or good than I.
I see her wisely bent;
And then, with bread and honey filled
To have it, still intent.
In wild Judea's land,
To feed the Baptist, when he cried,
“Heaven's kingdom is at hand.”
Had asked his friends for meat,
He ate the honey-comb they gave;
And showed his hands and feet.
I here can read within,
“Behold the lilies of the field—
They neither toil nor spin!”
In glory, like to them;”
Their Maker's power is so displayed
In flower and leaf and stem.
Who spake these blessed words,
Before him flowery fields spread wide—
Around were trees and birds.
On hill and valley deep,
I love to watch: and here I see
'T is written, “Feed my sheep.”
And feel how near I am
To that dear friend of children, who
Has named himself THE Lamb.
THE HOARY HEAD.
High estate dost thou possess!
They appear thy crown of glory,
In the way of righteousness.
Form the shining diadem,
Thou art from thy Sovereign wearing:
God's own finger silvered them.
By the gift of lengthened years;
In affliction's furnace brightened,
Tried by cares, and washed with tears.
Thou a thorny earth has trod;
With thy breast a high and holy
Temple of the living God.
Sere and withered, to the tomb;
But thy spirit, upward tending,
Budded for immortal bloom.
MY FATHER.
Wast of thy worn-out, sinking clay undressed,
Softly, by his pale hand, who comes to gather
Time's weary pilgrims home to joy and rest.
That day when thy last earthly sun went down:
Thy Sabbath, closing here, began in heaven;
Whilst thy meek brow changed ashes for a crown.
Heaved the tree-blossom, or the woodbine leaves;
Silent the bird, that sang about our dwelling,
Slept where she nestled, close beneath its eaves.
When time's last ray to thy mild eye was shed;
While death's cold touch, life's silver cord untwining,
Brought his chill night-dew on thy reverend head.
Here didst thou linger till one Sabbath more:
'T was holy time; thy pure heart stilled its beating;
Pain, work, and warfare were forever o'er!
Wont, by command of Heaven, the day to keep,
Called, at its evening, to the High and Holy,
Peaceful in Jesus thus to fall asleep!
Told, by its features, how the spirit smiled,
Through the dark, shadowy vale, by thy Redeemer
Led to his mansion, like a little child.
Clothed earth to greet thee in the flowers of May,
Brought them renewed; thy burial-spot adorning,
When fourscore years and ten had rolled away.
Leads off her young, forsaking here her nest,
Constant the wild bird, where thy dust is lying,
Sings her sweet hymn, a requiem to its rest.
Faithful, rewedded to its only bride;
And there thy latest-born, my younger brother,
Thy fond heart's care, sleeps closely by her side.
Is it so far, that now thou canst not see
Back to the shore, where lonely stands thy daughter,
Sprinkling its rocks and thorns with tears for thee?
May not be granted to her mortal sight;
When she so long watched o'er thy head so hoary,
Smoothing its pillow, till that mournful night?
Thy patient feet, with steady steps, have trod,
Safe now they walk the golden streets in beauty;
And, O! thy blessed eyes, in peace, see God!
A robin had, this spring, been seen taking materials from an old nest on an apple-tree near the door, and carrying them to the corner of the house, where she built on the top of the water-conductor, and close under the eaves, so near my father's chamber, that, when her brood had peeped, if the window was opened, their voices could be heard in the room, while she was feeding them.
A SAGE HATH DEPARTED.
The soul to himself, and its dust to the clod;
The cord He hath loosed, and the golden bowl broken,
Who formed them so precious. Be still! it is God.
From land unto land does the gloom spread away.
The seas give their wail to the winds o'er them sweeping—
The spirit, that spanned them, hath passed from the clay!
Around it, Philanthropy, Science and Art
Their tears for their friend, as in death he reposes,
Shower warm o'er the hand, and the head, and the heart.
The beauty, the grandeur, the power of his mind
The grave cannot hide! in his deeds he is living;
He shines in the light he diffused for mankind!
Its marks o'er the billowy desert to place,
While man has a heart, and the deep is in motion,
The wide world shall honor, the mariner trace.
His eye loved the blue arch of ether to climb;
His soul rose beyond them to lay up a treasure
More bright than the stars, more enduring than time.
In weeds, for the son of her pride and her love,
'T is his to behold, with a vision unclouded,
The glories unveiled of the Salem above.
In letters of light to each point beaming round,
A monument formed of his works, now is rearing
Its head, where with clusters of planets 't is crowned.
THE BURIAL OF SCHILLER.
When Saturday in Sabbath dies,
O'er Weimar hangs; with clouds that lower
And veil in black the moon and skies.
Pale glimmering through the midnight gloom.
A coffined form is on the bier,
And thence borne forward to the tomb.
They follow that cold sleeping clay;
While sighs and sobs of bitter wo
Sound deep along the silent way.
That dismal bier the bearers rest;
And heavier waves of sorrow's tide
Roll mighty o'er each mourner's breast.
As tremblingly they lift the pall,
The moon rends off her veil of cloud,
And o'er him lets her lustre fall.
And is again in darkness hid;
As if affrighted, thus to view
The name on that dread coffin lid.
Her friend, whom they to dust consign!
And ne'er again is she to pour
Her light,—for eyes like his to shine.
Too sacred for the glare of day,
Has passed beneath the shadowy night—
Earth, earth has closed o'er Schiller's clay!
They weep in torrents o'er his bed;
And searching, fiery bolts are thrown,
As if to find and wake the dead.
Befit him well to whom they 're paid;
And, at the birth of holy time,
'T is meet his dust at rest be laid.
Has burned its way through mortal strife;
And gained its high, intense desire
To solve the mystery of life.
This passing storm will call the bloom;
A tribute nature soon will pay,
To dress her deathless Poet's tomb.
FUNERAL HYMN FOR PRESIDENT HARRISON.
The dawn of our glory, our hopes full in bloom
Are changed, with the face of our Chieftain, our Father,
To sable and cypress to hang round his tomb.
A light, that for earth is no longer to burn,
Removed from its place, a sad nation is weeping;
And dark, where it shone, falls the shade of an urn.
Were sounding his name, and reflecting its beams,
The death-angel's wand opened grief's bitter fountain,
To quench their warm joys with its far-flowing streams.
A tie, which the hearts of a country had bound
To him, who is gone—who is gone, and forever,
To join the bright hosts who their Saviour surround!
Like him, who has left us, as orphans, below!
O did not the Sage on his dear younger Brother,
When called to thy presence, his mantle bestow?
We cry with our wound, asking balm from the Tree,
Whose leaves heal the nations: Hear, hear us, and quicken
Our wandering feet to return unto Thee!
DIRGE FOR FELICIA HEMANS.
They listened her notes to hear.
The voice was one of their own bright land;
But stained was the harp in their sister's hand,
With marks of the falling tear.
While many a beauteous leaf,
That looked like the growth of their heavenly bowers,
Was pale with the shade of her darksome hours,
Or wet with the dews of grief.
Her harp, and laid it aside:
The tremulous chords, at her parting look
And the farewell sweep of her fingers, shook,
And snapped as her numbers died.
And wooed her with them to soar,
Till spreading her wings like a peaceful dove,
Her spirit arose for a world of love
To wander on earth no more.
O weep! it will be forgiven,
That, fain we had kept in her bondage here
A soul so pure, and a voice so dear
Had longer withheld from heaven.
SHE DIED, AS DAWNED HER NATAL DAY.
Amid the buds and flowers of May
Her spirit left the beauteous clay,
In death's deep slumber here;
And mounting up her starry way,
Attained that holier sphere,
Where falls no night o'er birth-day light—
No sorrow brings a tear.
With radiance fill her heavenly eyes,
Where thornless flowers around her rise,
And founts that ne'er shall fail;
While here her form so lowly lies
All silent, cold and pale;
Where dews distil, and night-winds chill
Moan through the shadowy vale.
WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM, AFTER THE LINES OF A DECEASED FRIEND.
Who took so soon an angel's form on high—
After her name is my memorial placed
For thee, my friend, and it shall tell thee why.
A sacred halo round her name is thrown;
So, with the flowers that here her fingers wreathed
To borrow life from them, I twine my own.
Fragrant and fair, and thornless in its bloom:
Here with the precious odor that it gives,
I fain my simple offering would perfume.
Though death or duty put me far away,
These silent leaves may still unfold to thee
The wish of one who was thy friend to-day.
The blest allotment of thy sojourn here;
The portion of a child of God, thy wealth,
When time must close, and earth shall disappear!
THE SOVEREIGN OF BABYLON.
For his thousand lords, and his ladies all!
The sparkling wine to each guest is poured,
And mirth swells high at the festal board,
Where none hath the heart more careless and light,
Than he, whose glory must end to-night.
He calls for the vessels of silver and gold;
The spoils his idolatrous father brought,
'Mid the impious deeds which that proud one wrought,
From the temple of God, at Jerusalem,
That he and his nobles may drink from them.
To a laughing lip, as it speaks the praise
Of the gods of metal, of wood and stone,
But mocks at the name of the Holy One,
Whose finger this hour shall come so near:—
That lip will quiver and blanch with fear.
That can fix thy gaze and thy spirit appall?
Why is thy countenance changed, O king?
Is it one of thy gods this awe can bring,
Which makes thy knees together to smite,
Thine eye so wild, and thy cheek so white?
And who will the terrible words define?
A chain of gold shall encircle his neck—
A vesture of scarlet his form shall deck—
And the third, as ruler, shall be that seer,
With honor and power throughout Chaldea!”
Poor impotent one, shall explain that line!
But the captive of Judah, him thy queen
Has bid thee summon—let him be seen!
His eye prophetic receives its sight
From the Being, who caused the hand to write.
To spurn his gifts, but to read his fate;
To whom 't is inscribed on the lofty wall,
“Thou art weighed, found wanting, and now must fall!
Thy kingdom is numbered—the Persian and Mede
Shall hence to thy throne and thy power succeed!”
Shall win for that monarch the morning light!
The haughty head where the crown was set,
In dust is pillowed—with gore is wet!
Ye, who are trusting in honor and gold,
Look on him now, and your strength behold!
THE DEER STRICKEN BY TORCH-LIGHT.
And still through the forest they follow
The poor stricken deer, that has nowhere to hide,
And dared not to pause where the cool waters glide,
When, leaping the brook, he would almost have died,
One draught from its ripple to swallow.
The anguish of feeling it quiver,
When shook by the branches, the wave, or the air,
As forward he bounds, but without heeding where,
From thicket to crag, with the force of despair,
To plunge in the cold, sweeping river?
Had sunk, while their aim he evaded.
At evening, he sought a calm refuge of rest,
And dropped from pursuit, by his terrors oppressed,
Beneath the close branches, in verdure full-dressed,
By night and the covert o'ershaded.
For near the green turf where he laid him,
They lighted the torch, and they brandished it high;
That fatally shone for the death-shaft to fly;
His beauty, his beaming betrayed him:
The end of his tortures to quicken,
By letting the life in one blood-gush depart.
He seeks a retreat, like the warm, wounded heart,
When, lone, slow, and silent, the victim of art,
It dies, as a deer that is stricken.
THE DEATH OF SAPPHIRA.
Alas! she is gone in the sleep
That but the archangel can break;
For life hath no slumber so deep.
On those withered lips, where but now
An insult to Heaven was passed;
His dumbness hath followed the vow.
Hath blasted the pride of the clay;
The spirit, in boldness secure,
In guilt hath been stricken away.
The chosen of Jesus among,
To cover the fraud of thy hand,
By falsehood to him on thy tongue!
To shroud in a mantle so frail!
Its perfidy, thus by its art,
To think from Omniscience to veil!
The form of thy partner in sin
Was borne, wan and cold, from the door,
Where thou didst so rashly come in.
The clods o'er his bosom to lay,
Were waiting, the threshold about,
To bear thee to darkness away.
Or Pity thy spirit recall,
To light up its dwelling once more,
It should not thus hopelessly fall.
From death's awful brink to recede;
To shun the despair and the pain
Where she is forbidden to plead.
The more, that she cannot relume
The clay whence the self-wounded soul
Hath rushed to a suicide's doom.
O gold, of a mortal must be,
To challenge an arm from above—
To stake earth and heaven for thee!
And who shall their coming abide,
When wrath the most fearful of all,
“The wrath of the Lamb,” is defied?
WILLIAM AT SEA.
Beneath thy light bark, ever mindful of thee,
The days of thine absence, at home we are telling,
And counting the hours of our William at sea.
Or watching the sport of the spray and the foam,
If pensive on deck, or in dreams on thy pillow,
We know hast thy soul rapt with visions of home.
Or smiles a “good night,” as the west he descends,
Thy heart, pointing back, to itself tells the story
Of mansion paternal, and kindred and friends.
While bending with offerings of praise and of prayer,
To God we commend thee afar on the ocean,
We feel thou art kneeling for us to him there.
The two fluid worlds thou art tossing between—
The cold deep below, and the skies bending o'er thee,
Alone by their changes will vary the scene.
Rude ocean's green oasis, rest thy glad eye,
'T will fade as a cloud—as a phantom departing,
'T will sink in the circle that bounds sea and sky.
Thy heart on that wide watery desert to cheer,
Arise, like a star through night's solitude beaming,
With meteor swiftness she'll soon disappear.
Comes near on her passage, for one language more,
O! how wilt thou long, ere she flies thee, to hail her,
To ask whither bound, and the tidings from shore!
Thy way o'er that desolate deep may be found,
'T is marked with the impress of Deity only;
His merciful arms will thy frailty surround.
His presence is power, and his banner is love,
To look from that flood, to the firmament showing
Bright shadowings-forth of his glory above.
Though clouds rolled on clouds hide the stars and the sun,
Thy soul's chosen Friend never, never will fail thee!
Winds and waves but obey that omnipotent One.
When wide yawns the deep, and the surges swell high,
Thy spirit may hear the kind voice of her Father,
Still whispering, “Be of good cheer; it is I.”
Besetting his course, who so widely would roam,
Then speed thy return from the land of the Ganges,
From pagod and painim! Dear William, come home.
Where arms open wide to receive thee will be;
And promise, while yet to the heart they infold thee
To be, never after, our William at sea!
MY PORTRAIT.
Yet, in thy silence, with the power
A crowd of feelings deep to bring
Unknown until the present hour.
Not human pride, nor vanity
Could ask the artist hand to do,
And show the world a deed like thee.
To have upon the canvass cast
My semblance, thus to leave behind
My shadow, when myself am past?
Will ever weep beside thee, more
Than mine does now, I know not why—
It never dropped such tears before.
To last, when I have passed from sight—
When time and earth to me are closed,
To be in time and earthly light.
The thought that I shall pass away,
And those, who have thee then to keep,
May glance at thee, and still be gay.
For fear that others will not grieve?
And what to others then will be
A shade of life, that I may leave?
Gush up these hot, resistless tears;
Whilst thou, cold, heartless, stoic thing,
Dost wear a smile that 's set for years.
From being every line of thee,
The spirit, which thy prototype
Enshrined, shall live eternally!
THE WIDOW'S ONLY SON.
And walked beside the sea;
But seldom of her sorrow spoke,—
Too full of grief was she!
To view the ocean wide:
The only son, that widow had,
Went out to sea and died.
With solemn, tearful eyes,
His mess-mates lowered him down, to sleep
Till all the dead shall rise.
With ceaseless fall and swell,
Her child to that repose had passed,
The mother none could tell.
As up they heaved to shore,
If they had rolled across his grave,
Whom she must see no more.
With full, returning sail,
The color would forsake her lip,
And speech and vision fail.
That spread its canvass white,
To waft away her only son
Forever from her sight!
Which wrung that widow's heart,
Her spirit felt the sweet relief
That faith and hope impart.
The path to heavenly rest—
That, when he sank in death, he slept
Upon a Saviour's breast.
“I know the troubled sea
But holds from me the precious clay:
My child 's at home with thee!”
THE YOUNG MOTHER.
But still the young mother sat by it and wept:
She rocked not the cradle, she sang not the song,
The sleep of her dear, only child to prolong.
That oft wrapped it sleeping, lay light o'er its form;
Its pillow was downy, and smooth was its bed,
And yet, that sad mother! her fond bosom bled.
Was now of her voice, or its home on her breast;
She caught not the sound nor the balm of its breath:
She knew that her little one slumbered in death!
The features and form of her child as it lay;
But false were the hues and the touches of art
To paint the bright image enshrined in her heart.
No pencil of earth could the likeness supply;
Nor yet on the canvass was mortal to trace
A smile the pure spirit had left on that face.
Had shed, on the dust they allured it to leave,
A sign of the peace, of the joy, and the love,
Encircling for aye the young angel above.
Must be from her sight laid forever away!
The gloom left her soul, as a cloud leaves the sun;
It whispered, “Thy will, O my Father, be done!”
EVENING AT ANDOVER SEMINARY-HILL.
The lofty Hill of Andover,
Where sacred science holds the light
That beams to distant lands from her.
Where, from afar, disciples meet
For lore divine, in holy bands
To sit and learn at Wisdom's feet.
Is kept and taught Jehovah's will:—
The LAW, whose voice in thunder falls—
The GOSPEL, whispering, “Peace! be still!”
I seemed to breathe Mount's Zion's air;
I set my foot with awe profound,
As if the ark of God were there.
For holier thoughts the soul to fill;
As if the Shechinah had come
To rest upon that reverend hill.
And from its foot, in landscape wide,
Profusely nature's charms were spread,
Till in the distance vision died.
The drowsy flowers began to close;
The breezes lulled, that stirred the vine;
And all things tended to repose.
Was sinking fast to pass from view,
Calm as the righteous when he dies
To earth, in heaven to live anew.
His golden smile was backward cast,
As if he loved that favored height
To bless the longest and the last.
The full-orbed moon arose serene,
Through evening's hush and night's cool shade
To throw her lustre o'er the scene.
The stately seminary pile,
And fell on tree, and flower, and green,
Where pearly dews distilled the while.
Her light, within the place of prayer,
Till bright-winged angels, from the throne
Above, seemed met and hovering there.
A spirit bowed in dust to raise
Ennobled, till its every power,
Awaked to joy, was tuned to praise.
Shall thy dear Zion rise and shine
Above her foes—Ah! Lord, how soon?—
When shall the ends of earth be thine?
HYMN OF THE PARTING CLASS.
SUNG BY THEOLOGICAL STUDENTS.
Is in our midst, to loose the band
So close, so sacred, and so dear,
That long hath bound us, brethren, here.
United at the throne of grace,
Our prayers shall rise—our voices pour
In praise, when this, our song is o'er.
We to his work must hence away;
For great the field—the laborers few!
What wilt thou, Lord, have us to do?
To fire our hearts with heavenly love;
And light our lips with truth, that we
May, witnesses, go forth for thee.
To spread the glory of thy cross—
From shades and death redeemed, to bring
The priceless jewels of our King.
On heathen shores our lot may be,
To dying souls to bear the bread
And balm of life on Calvary shed.
And some beneath a foreign star,
We may look upward to the Sun
Of righteousness, and still be one.
In joy we'll meet on high at last;
And there, in praise, our voices swell
The song, where enters no farewell.
THE SPECKLED ONE.
To waft thy name around;
So, let me take it on my strain,
To give it air and sound.
For these are oft the things
That give a name its greatest worth,
Its gorgeous plumes and wings.
Affrighted from my way.
Dismiss thy terrors—turn, and stop;
And hear what I may say.
This truly should not be.
Then calmly pause, and let me scan
My Maker's work in thee.
We 're fellow-creatures here;
And power should not be armed with wrong,
Nor weakness filled with fear.
To burrow in a hole—
To have a form I envy not,
And that without a soul.
I see thee void of grace;
And that a look supremely grim,
Reigns o'er thy solemn face.
Nor should it make us load
With obloquy, and scorn, and shame
The honest name of Toad.
In presence so uncouth,
Thou ne'er hast told an evil tale
Of falsehood, or of truth.
Nor hands to mischief prone;
Nor yet thy heart to discontent;
Though spurned, and poor and lone.
In thy bright golden eye,
That calm and innocently turns
On all below the sky.
No words of folly pass,
Nor, are they found to taste and sip
The madness of the glass.
From earth, and wood, and stone;
And when thy means by these are gone,
Thou seem'st to live on none.
Sealed close, shut up alive,
From food, drink, air, sun, moon and star,
Thou 'lt live and even thrive:
Will issue from the lid
Of thy dark dwelling under ground,
When it is deeply hid.
Whereon is a supply,
Of nourishment within thyself,
Concealed from mortal eye.
'T were well for us to know,
To keep us up in flesh and heart,
When outer means grow low.
On such mysterious shelves,
Why, none could rob or beggar us;
Unless we lost ourselves!
With every human breast—
To live as in the cynic's tub,
And yet be self-possessed!
Beyond our tub, to show
That we in head and heart are sound,
Is one great thing to know.
To let no murmur through,
However hard we find the coop,
Is greater still to do.
Amid thy low estate,
And to thy burrow bear the palm
For victory over fate.
The lot we cannot shape,
And hug to death the ills and care
From which there 's no escape.
THE MOON OF A WINTRY NIGHT.
That o'er us, on the fields of ether spread,
Threatens, ere morning to be here below,
To lie where our poor mortal feet must tread.
That shrouds its lustre like a frozen veil;
And kills the twinkling of the starry rays,
Till all on high looks cheerless, dim, and pale.
The skies so rayless, yet so far from dark;
As when our hearth's white ashes, tired and cold,
We stir in vain to find one pleasant spark.
And thou be shining there, serene and clear,
While we are hedged by many a frigid drift;
Or sleigh-bells shrill may pierce the tingling ear.
To light, and for the burning stars to view!
The hard ice coating all the lakes and streams,
And one dead white where late gay flowerets grew.
Like skeletons, will slender shadows throw
On what seems spread as nature's winding-sheet,
While her slain beauties lie concealed below.
Where one pale uniform invests the whole,
Though it should make one's vital current chill,
It must not let in winter to the soul!
To kill affection's tendrils—friendship's root,
Where vernal shoots and buds should ever start,
And grow with summer flowers and autumn fruit:
Or, pressed beneath incumbent ice, grow low;
But, like the fount that irrigates the field,
Make bloom and verdure spring, where'er they flow.
Like birds of summer from the cold withdrawn;
But wise, the mind should, like the prudent bee,
On honey banquet, though the flowers are gone.
Or quench the beaming of her upturned eye,
Or close her ear, or make her members numb,
Ere her thank-offerings on the altar lie.
To see thy silvery lustre sprinkled here,
When these bare branches all appear full-dressed,
In some more gentle season of the year.
Falling to bathe the sleeping buds and flowers;
And soft, and silent, coolly streaming through
The whispering leaves, that clothe the summer bowers.
Along the flower-sprent borders of the rill,
With rich, deep shadows stamped, o'erspread the vale,
Or bind the forehead of the silent hill.
Where, one soft hour before, the robin sung
Her vesper song; the while, in downy sleep,
With peaceful breast she guards her callow young.
Moans in the hedge behind the cottage-eaves;
And when the plaintive crickets, hidden, trill
Their harvest-hymn among the golden sheaves.
Fresh budding hope from memory's root that grows,
When thou and we have struggled through the snows.
From thy pure azure home, with face serene,
While I will look abroad, and up to thee,
And bless the great Creator of the scene.
When veiled in part, or wholly from their view;
Yet, though twelve times a year thou seems't to change,
Again twelve times I ever find thee true.
Or rolled before thee, that our darkness brings,
Just as earth's bulk or vapor hides or clouds
Our glorious view of higher, holier things.
TOM TAR.
The sailor stout and bold,
Who o'er the ocean roamed so far,
To countries new and old.
Would ne'er complain nor frown,
Though high and low the wind and sea
Might toss him up and down.
He had the happy art,
When all around was storm, to keep
Fair weather in his heart.
He 'd always cast about,
And find within he 'd calm enough
To stand the storms without.
By sighs for what we lack;
Nor can it mend a vessel strained,
To let our temper crack.
That any man should dread,
Is that, which in the bosom forms,
And musters to the head.”
His mess-mates he would cheer,
And often put their fears to rest,
When dangers gathered near.
And surges swept the deck,
Tom Tar was ever found the last,
Who would forsake the wreck.
The waters plucked from him,
Why, these, he felt, were small to lose,
Could he keep up and swim!
That rose on every hand,
He 'd, somehow, always find a way
Of getting safe to land.
Of Heaven had filled his soul:
His trust was firm in One above,
Howe'er the seas might roll.
And many a wonder seen:
The stories he could tell would more
Than fill a magazine.
Almost, that man can know;
But envied not the rich and great,
Nor scorned the poor and low.
Superb, in glittering vest;
The savage, too, that roams the wood,
In skins and feathers dressed.
And beasts, and birds, and flowers,
And fruits, of many a shape and hue,
In lands remote from ours.
Her breast in ocean lave;
And bold sea-lions, playing, toss
Their heads above the wave.
Went flashing to the sun,
A swarm of flying fish attack,
And swallow every one!
Had sported in his view;
And hungry sharks pursued his sail,
As if they 'd eat the crew.
The children, at their play,
Were glad to have the sailor come,
And greet them by the way.
The laughing girls and boys
Would find, that on their aprons fell,
To put among their toys.
Where gloomy waters roar:
These polished stones, so smooth and round,
Rough surges washed ashore.
'T is made and marked by One,
Who gave the warmth, and lit the beams
Of yon great shining sun.
Along the ocean strand,
Their beauteous finish brings to mind
Their Maker's perfect hand.
And far from human eye,
I think of him who made the stone,
And shell, and sea, and sky.
Though cold and rough the blast:
My safest guide I know he is,
Where'er my lot is cast.”
“These treasures from afar
He brought us! Blessings on his head!
For he 's a good Tom Tar!”
THE SEAMAN'S HYMN.
While your eyes are sealed in sleep,
Seamen, tossed 'mid foam and billows,
Roam, for you, a boisterous deep.
When the glorious light of day
Is on your homes so peaceful dawning,
Along our pathless, troubled way
The surge swells high, the flood is yawning.
Or your hearths are bright and warm;
We behold the wild waves booming,
Mount the shrouds, and brave the storm.
Singing birds your hearing greet—
Your hearts the kindred tone rejoices;
While winds, that on our canvass beat,
And roaring ocean join their voices.
When ye to his throne repair,
O before him, meek and lowly,
Bow for us, as suppliants there!
When his blessed day appears,
The dearest, best of all the seven,
Your souls the gospel herald cheers;
But none tells us of rest and heaven.
Often, on the bended knee,
Cry to Him, who rules the waters,
For the wanderers o'er sea!
Now, to Thee, the seaman's Friend,
Our guide—our light—our ark abiding,
Our Saviour, we our all commend,
While time's rude waves in frailty riding.
THE MARINER'S SONG OF DEPARTURE.
With her streamers at play,
Our bark in her beauty is gliding,
As brothers, are we,
The glad sons of the sea,
Our own darling element riding.
For the skies are all blue;
And yonder, blue billows are bounding.
We speed from the port,
To be off by the fort,
While her gun to the sunrise is sounding.
That a warm heart can bind,
In home, love, and friendship endearing;
While hope flies before,
For a far, foreign shore,
As the hand at the rudder is steering.
The proud waters below,
That hence are by us to be ridden;
'Mid the corals and caves
There are mariners' graves,
Dark wrecks, and lost treasures deep hidden.
Be the way light or dark,
Our Sun, and the Star that we follow,
Is He, who unbinds
Or enchains the strong winds;
Whose hand holds the seas in its hollow.
The wild storm-spirit rise,
And spread his black wings full of thunder,
Our canvass we'll reef,
Or heave-to for relief,
And safely his pinions pass under.
On the flood-waves of life,
To Heaven in our ark lowly bending
For help would we cry,
Till the dove, from on high,
Appears with the peace-branch descending.
Wheresoe'er we may roam
The wide seas, from pole to equator—
We 've a light, and high-tower,
In the name and the power
Of him, who is ocean's Creator.
THE SEA-EAGLE'S FALL.
Hung o'er the summer sea;
And ne'er did airy, feathered king
Look prouder there than he.
Amid the limpid brine;
And felt it now was time to know
Whereon he was to dine.
So near the surface swim,
He felt at once a hungry wish
To make a feast of him.
A sudden plunge he gave;
And pouncing, seized, with murderous force,
His tempter in the wave.
Within the slippery prize,
In hope his ruffian grasp to keep;
And high and dry to rise.
As ever monarch made;
And, for that rash—that cruel swoop,
He soon most dearly paid!
To yield to this attack.
His feet the eagle could not free
From off the scaly back.
His mastery now was gone!
And on, by that prepondering weight,
And downward, he was drawn.
Where he could move with grace;
And flap, and dash, his pinions went,
In ocean's wrinkled face.
His forfeit life to save;
And planted thus, he writhed about
Upon his gaping grave.
To bid adieu to light:
The water bubbled in his beak—
He sank from human sight!
The foreigner to view.
To see an airy monarch drowned,
To them was something new!
And darted swift away;
While some his parting plumage shook,
And nibbled him for prey.
So high and proudly soar,
Could think how awkwardly—how soon,
He 'd fall to rise no more?
Were his an hour ago,
Deprived of all, that eagle died,
For stooping once too low!
Of biped, from his sphere
Descending, like that silly bird,
To buy a fish so dear?
THE CAGED LION.
Sad behind thy prison grate,
Monarch, how I long to bring
Back to thee thy lost estate!
Where thy native sky is warm,
Sufferer, how I long to give
Freedom to that noble form!
Bounding over Afric's plain,
Wildly, with the desert air
Wafting wide thy flowing mane.
What thou wast, at liberty,
When “The Lion of the tribe
Of Judah” names his type in thee?
Where the blasts of winter freeze,
Think'st thou of that palmy land,
Thy mild country o'er the seas?
Round thee set so strong and thick,
Do not sun, and moon, and stars
Make thy cowering spirit sick?
Were thy gifts by nature made;
Yet, in one unhappy hour,
All to lose, wast thou betrayed.
Never after to be free,
How thy mighty spirit wrought
In thee, like a troubled sea!
Of the deep indignity,
To which thou then wast doomed to sink—
Of the exile thou must be.
Tells me of a pining heart:
Homesick prisoner, sooner die
Than remain the thing thou art.
Liberty is life and breath!
So no less to thee and thine—
Bonds to both but lingering death.
THE TRAVELLER AT THE RED SEA.
I gaze on thy face, and I listen to thee,
With spirit o'erawed by the sight and the sound,
While mountain and desert frown gloomy around.
Which God swept apart for his people of old—
That Egypt's proud army, unstained by their blood,
Received on thy bed, to entomb in thy flood.
A throng of pale spectres, no waters can drown,
With banner and blades, seem to rise on the waves,
As Pharaoh's bold hosts rushed in arms to their graves.
At silent Omnipotence shrinking with awe;
And each sinks away in his billowy shroud,
From him who walked here, clothed in fire and a cloud.
Sustained by the hand of Jehovah, dry-shod;
And think how the song of salvation, they sang,
With praise to his name, through the wilderness rang.
Console, and rebuke in their wanderings wide,
From these gloomy waters, through this desert drear,
O still in life's maze, to thy pilgrim be near!
The soul, that would break from their bondage away,
Forever be drowned in the blood of thy Son,
Who o'er sin and death hath the victory won.
And give, for my thirst, the Rock-fountain to flow,
Refreshed by the way, will I speed to the clime
Of rest for the weary, beyond earth and time.
THE HEBREW CAPTIVES.
The blood of our prophets and kindred they drained!
And us, from our desolate homes did they bear
Afar, the cold chains of the Painim to wear.
They looked on our woes with an insolent eye;
Our burdens were heavy, our fetters were strong;
And then, they required of us mirth and a song!
By Babylon's rivers we sat down to weep;
The song of the Lord, as too holy to sound,
We shut in our souls, on that dark heathen ground.
By each gentle breeze, that went silently by;
But poured not the strains in the proud Painim's ear,
That God and his angels will hearken to hear!
FRAGMENTS FROM “ESTHER,” A POEM.
The vesture, whose jewels emblazoned the throne:
His lovely young queen, who in sackcloth is dressed,
Is far from his presence, and weeping alone.
For mercy? To whom will the sovereign give ear?
'T is death now to be, in his kingdom, a Jew—
'T is death in his presence uncalled to appear.
The helpless young Jewess, so gentle and fair,
To live with her people, or die for their sake,
Will go to her lord, and her nation declare.
The joy of his heart—the delight of his eyes,
Is born of that race whom the Persians deride—
A people, his nation oppress and despise.
In Esther's still chamber there's fasting, and prayer;
While he with the crown, has the homage of earth,
She calls on her God her doomed people to spare.
She thinks of the bush, as in Horeb it burned;
She knows who the hearts of the kings hath in hand,
To turn them, as rivers of water are turned.
She sends up the cries of her soul from the dust;
Then, rising to go to the king, is resigned
To do this and perish, if perish she must.
But o'er her young face beams the sunrise of soul;
And flesh, though but feeble, and ready to fail,
Is urged to its point by the spirit's control.
The holy believer, unawed and serene;
She goes to the presence, adorned as a saint,
With power that has never invested the queen.
To peace, and their rights, when resistance had failed:
A woman in weakness, who drew on the Lord
For strength, o'er the mighty of earth hath prevailed.
As pearls, to Jehovah are precious and bright.
The hand, that in sorrow has here been thy trust,
Will crown thee with joy in the kingdom of light.
GONE IN HER BEAUTY.
Wild round her mansion, trouble not her sleep:
Gone in her beauty! Fast the drifting snows
Fall cold, but harmless, o'er her deep repose!
Love hath but tears to fill the place she left.
Sigh calls to sigh, from aching bosoms drawn.
Void gives to void the mournful echo, “gone!”
Sweet opening flowers, their odors there to pour,
Striving to win her forth, who planted them,
Once more to smile that they adorn the stem.
She was a fairer, lovelier flower than they,
Snapped off in blooming! ere a leaf could fade,
Cast into darkness! wrapped in silent shade!
Pour forth her fountains for the soul's relief?
Not to the dust to nourish earthly weeds:
They yield no balsam while the spirit bleeds!
But to death's victor may the weeper go!
His risen glory, chasing mortal gloom,
Shows grief a rainbow, bending o'er the tomb.
THE NUN.
And cross and veil, in gloomy cell,
What guilty deed was done by thee,
To cause thee here immured to dwell?
That we may clearly judge, and know
If violated human laws
Imprison and afflict thee so:
That haunts thy contrite soul with fears;
And here sequesters thee within
The place of fasting, gloom, and tears?
Why, thou art human, it is true;
Which is alone enough for grace
To have renewing work to do.
Thy duty 's bounds so closely set,
That faith may plough, and sow, and reap
By trials shunned, instead of met?
Make of a tender opening soul
A close, dark blue convolvulus,
And give its bloom this inward roll?
Of life and joy intend to win,
By here supinely sitting down,
Where others but the race begin?
By hiding from thy Saviour's foes;
Or hope in Gilead's sacred balm
A cure for self-inflicted woes?
And therefore claim indulgence now,
If I presume to question more
Than courtesy might, else, allow:
For light, I ask to be informed
How, by a string of pegs and beads,
A soul is raised, or fed, or warmed.
What is the potent, hidden charm
Hung on that string, or in its twist
Contorted, for repelling harm?
It cannot mount to God above;
But here must substitute a saint,
In image, for a heavenly love?
Whose gifts are light and liberty,
Left in his Word the mitimus
That here confines and fetters thee?
For souls, endowed with vital grace;
Or need surrounding convent gloom,
To show the radiance of his face?
That he has drawn, and left below,
That by it every pious heart
May follow on the Lord to know?
Did he consume his earthly days?
With houseless head, and weary feet,
What were his works? and where his ways?
Hide not thy candle, if 't is lit:
Be in, but be not of the world,
If thou wouldst shine to lighten it.
And see, if, smit on either cheek,
Thy righteous soul would then endure
To turn the other, and be meek.
If we are gold, we must be tried;
If stones, we must be hewn for use,
Or by the builder cast aside.
To give us smoothness, shape, and size,
Are in the world—the furnace there;
For Heaven the gold and silver tries.
Ah, then, our savor, to be known,
Must be diffused; for what 's the worth
Of salt en masse, boxed up alone?
If we have safely hid our life,
Is found in pitfall, flood, and fire,
Allurements sweet, and bitter strife.
The flowery earth, and shining skies:
Say wherefore God created these;
And then, fair Nun, thy beauteous eyes.
The glorious things he spread to view—
To give earth, ocean, air, and light,
And freedom, for a dismal mew?
To man, in self-delusion made,
An heir of heaven is brought to bow,
That vow were better broke than paid.
His name endorsed a pledge for thee,
When Christ has died to pay thy debt,
And burst the tomb to make thee free?
The fight of faith must well be fought,
And each good warrior seen to wear
The armor for the victory wrought.
Thy foe, thy tempter, who has found
This cunning way to corner thee,
To keep thee from the battle-ground?
And doff that outward, odd disguise,
That cumbers thee, if thou wouldst run,
Or fight the fight, to win the prize.
And give its radiance room to play;
Bind on thy shoes and armor tight,
And up, and to the field away!
TREES FOR THE PILGRIM'S WREATH.
Knowing that tribulation worketh patience, and patience experience, and experience hope; and hope maketh not ashamed.
Romans v. 3–5.Or by thorny gain, the cross,
Thou art not a barren tree;
Seeds of Patience drop from thee.
Upward, till we reach the fruit,
Thou hast golden grains to sow,
Whence Experience full shall grow.
Thick in leaves, and rough in bark;
Through thy dubious shade we grope,
Till we grasp the bough of Hope.
Showered by drops from Calvary,
When thy branches shoot and bloom
Through a Saviour's broken tomb.
For his crown the mingled leaves,
Wreaths of you are rich and bright;
Earth 's the shade, and heaven 's the light.
THE MUSHROOM'S SOLILOQUY.
And darkness, into sudden being thrust?
What was I yesterday? and what will be,
Perchance, to-morrow, seen or heard of me?
To bear the new, full glory of the morn,
Beneath the garden wall I stand aside,
With all before me, beauty, show, and pride.
A thing unfit for use—unfit for sight;
Less like her work, than like a piece of art,
Whirled out and trimmed exact in every part?
No fruit, nor branch, nor leaf, nor bud is mine.
No humming-bird, nor butterfly, nor bee
Will come to cheer, caress or flatter me.
No spicy odors on the air I shed;
But here I'm stationed in my sober suit,
With only top and stem—I 've scarce a root.
I know not whence I sprang, or where I tend;
Yet, I will wait and trust, and ne'er presume
To question Justice—I, a frail Mushroom!
THE SPIRIT AND THE MOUNTAIN.
Fast beside the sea,
What was in thy keeping put,
Prisoned under thee?
Feel it rock and quake!
Struggling fires, beneath me bound,
Strive their chains to break.”
Girded o'er thy heart,
Does it pierce thine aged breast,
When its lightnings dart?
Of the bolt is felt:
Here, the fiery chain and flash
But adorn my belt.”
Stainless on thy brow,
Wilt thou never cast it down—
Never, never bow?
From my Maker's throne,
I will bow and disappear,
Hence to be unknown.”
Thine old hoary head,
What is written on the sky,
Thou so long hast read?
Shining over me,
I behold the name of One
Thou must die to see!”
Glowing is thy speech;
Mighty import flashes thence;
What is it to teach?
I shall melt away;
While of thee, soul—spirit, death
Ne'er shall quench a ray!”
THE FALL OF THE STATUE.
A SCENE OF THE REVOLUTION.
This declaration [of Independence] was received by the people with transports of joy. Public rejoicings took place in various parts of the Union. In New York, the statue of George III. was taken down; and the lead, of which it was composed, was converted into musket-balls.
Goodrich's History of the United States.All o'er our fair country had gathered the storm,
Which wore in its coming, so fearful a form,
But left us the rainbow of peace,
An image of royalty, stately and proud—
A leaden old king, where his votaries bowed;
While true friends of Liberty marked it, and vowed
That its honors should speedily cease.
Declaring us free, with pure freedom of mind,
Columbia's true sons, feeling strongly inclined
To learn how the statue was based,
Assembled forthwith; and, besieging it, found
That the king in head, body and limb was quite sound,
And had of good lead in him many a pound,
Which might be more usefully placed.
From a mingling of voices together, was heard,
With shoutings aloud, as they gave out the word,
“Down with it! let it come down!
We'll soon transform his grave highness of lead,
And turn him to balls from the feet to the head;
And then shall the mouths of our muskets be fed
With him of the throne and the crown.
And their names to a broad Declaration have set,
That they are resolved, from this moment, to get
Of the king independent and free;
And to give by their valor a nation her birth,
Or to empty their veins, a free gift to the earth,
In Liberty's name, to betoken her worth
To us and the millions to be.
'T is time that her blood and her spirit should rise
Above her oppressors, till tyranny flies,
And leaves her unfettered, to bear
The flag of a nation instead of a chain—
The palm of her triumph, 'mid weakness and pain,
O'er them that were mighty, but struggled in vain
To force her their shackles to wear.
Proclaiming our vassalage here, in the land
Of lovely Manhattan! We'll each lend a hand
And flat to the ground, in a trice, as we bring
His dignified form, it shall merrily ding,
To sound all around how we honor the king,
And pay our respects to John Bull.
The nerves of their arms, and the worth of their polls!
So, we'll have his Majesty over the coals,
And make him the first that shall run:
When, heated to melting, he hides in the mould,
We'll hold him there still, till new-shapen and cold;
Then, off he shall go, like a tale that is told,
In the voice of the thundering gun!
And fly at his friends for our cause in the fight,
To scatter his subjects—to purchase our right—
The land of oppression to clear.
And he, to whom, whizzing, his monarch shall come,
In the form of a ball, 'mid the noise of the drum,
The flashes and smoke, will have finished the sum
Of his deeds as a royalist here!”
The dust rose above him, and mounted the blast,
While a bevy of Rome's feathered sentinels passed,
But, how the proud royalist felt, when the lead
Of his late British Majesty came at his head,
While some dropped before it, and some turned and fled,
Is more than a Yankee can tell.
THE BIRD'S MATERNAL CARE.
Its city owner's door,
Its branches threw so high and wide,
That many a bird could sing, and hide
Among the leaves it bore.
In that green rustling tree.
At evening, there she sank to rest
And furled her weary wings, as blest
As little bird could be.
Beneath her folded wing,
She pillowed, while the night-hours fled:
When morning flushed the east with red,
She 'd wake, and mount, and sing.
In that soft nest she laid.
So clear and vivid was their blue,
Like polished balls they shone to view,
Of purest sapphire made.
Those treasures, till they grew,
In what the shells contained before,
To something different—something more—
Young birds came peeping through!
In that fond robin's nest,
All callow; and their mother's care
Was now to find their daily fare,
And shield them with her breast.
From some far distant stem
She 'd bring them; then her beak she 'd wipe,
And sit upon a twig, and pipe
A mother's tune to them.
One dismal, stormy day,
His window from the shade to free,
The better in his room to see,
Some branches lopped away.
A curtain o'er the nest.
The sun burnt through the clouds, and flung
His fire the helpless brood among,
Till they were sore oppressed.
To stand on weary feet,
Where now they missed the leafy green,
With one wing raised her babes to screen
From sultry noontide heat.
Upon her nest's round edge,
Stood up to keep the sun away,
While, shaded thus, her nestlings lay
Till time their forms could fledge.
Beheld what love and care
Within a mother bird could be,
He wished in vain that he could see
The bough still living there.
Or grieve a feeling heart,
Wherein the anguish must remain,
While we may wish, but wish in vain,
To lay or lull the smart.
And so 's a good undone!
We, serving self, on self may bring
A heavier ill—a keener sting
Than what we sought to shun.
That make our vast account.
No one, though great, does all God's will.
Small drops the caves of ocean fill;
And sands compose the mount.
SONG.
Looking as if 't were cut out of a star,
How do I know but it once was on high,
Beaming through evening, sublime from afar?
When he composed thee an optic so bright,
Making the skill of his finger to shine,
Drew from those high upper regions of light.
Fleet as the air,—as the rainbow in hues,
How can I tell but the Ruler of kings
Formed them by those his blest ministers use?
Was not the delicate down of thy breast,
Caught from the flowers that in Paradise bloom,—
Plucked from the couch where the weary ones rest?
Tuned like a seraph's, deep, flowing, and clear,
Was not thy melody, touching and choice,
Taught by some angel, who visited here?
Fleet as a vision, without a reply,
Just like all other bright treasures below,
Charming a moment, to change or to fly?
THE WHITE MOTH.
Beware of the lamp's dazzling rays!
It is not a drop of the sun! but a light
That shines to allure little rovers by night;
Away! there is death in the blaze.
The vine, round my window so bright;
And pop in to know what was here to be seen,
Forsaking thy shield, and escaping thy screen,
And hazarding life by the flight?
That flame would most fatally singe:
And nothing thy beautiful wings can insure
From harm and from pain beyond mending or cure,
If caught by their delicate fringe.
And breathe in the fresh evening air;
Go, look at the stars, as they twinkle and shine;
And cling to a leaf, or the tendrils that twine,
My soft little eavesdropper, there!
Why thus I have lifted my arm
To scare thee away from thy luminous foe,
That threw out its beams, as a snare, and a show
To tempt the unwary to harm.
Who, greater and wiser than I,
Has pitied my frailty; and forced me to shun
Illusive temptations, where I might have run
The peril of sporting to die.
Myself through the darkness of night,
That taught me so quick to come in, as a friend,
Between thee and evil, thy life to defend;
Pretty Moth, so unsullied and white.
EDWARD AND CHARLES.
Where they looked for the flowers, that, along the way-side,
So lately were blooming and fair;
But their delicate heads by the frost had been nipped;
Their stalks by the blast were all twisted and stripped;
And nothing but ruin was there.
Exclaimed little Charles, “and has choked the bright rills
With leaves that are faded and dead!
The few on the trees are fast losing their hold,
And leaving the branches so naked and cold,
That the beautiful birds have all fled.”
A great many charms by the touch of the frost,
Which used to appear to the eye;
But then, it has opened the chestnut-burr too,
The walnut released from the case where it grew;
And now is our Thanksgiving nigh!
“I guess,” answered Charles, “we shall all go away
Of turkeys, plum-puddings, and pies by the dozens,
For Grandpa' and Grandma', aunts, uncles and cousins;
And at night we'll all play blind-man's-buff.
About the old times, with their Wigs and their Tories;
And what sort of men they could be;
When some spread their tables without any cloth,
With basins and spoons, and the fuming bean-broth,
Which they took for their coffee and tea.
About in their streets; for, if not every day,
At least it was nothing uncommon,
To see them pile on the poor back of one horse
A saddle and pillion; and what was still worse,
Up mounted a man and a woman!
Away about town at full trot would they go;
Or perhaps to a great country marriage—
To Thanksgiving-supper—to husking, or ball;
Or quilting; for thus did they take nearly all
Their rides, on an animal carriage.
But Grandma' will tell; and perhaps let us see
That stiff damask gown, with its sharp-pointed waist,
The hoop, the craped-cushion, and buckles of paste,
Which they wore in her grandparents' day.
To wear on their coats with their square, standing collars:
And then, there 's a droll sort of hat,
Which Mary once fixed me one like, out of paper,
And said she believed 't was called, three-cornered scraper;
Perhaps, too, she'll let us see that.
At the South, what it is, I guess they 'd have one too;
But I have heard somebody say,
That, there, they call all the New England folks Bumpkins,
Because we eat puddings, and pies made of pumpkins,
And have our good Thanksgiving-day.”
That they might go to church, if they do n't like the feast;
To hear the sweet anthems of praise, that we give
To Him, on whose bounty we constantly live:—
It is feasting the ear and the heart.
Who gives every blessing, wherewith we are crowned,
Their gratitude who can withhold?
And now how I wish I could know all the poor
Their Thanksgiving-stores had already secure,
Their fuel, and clothes for the cold!”
But wishes alone, can fill nobody's dish,
Or clothe them, or build them a fire.
And now I will give you the money, my sons,
Which I promised, you know, for your drum and your guns,
To spend in the way you desire.”
For how many comforts this money might pay,
In something for clothing or food:
At length they resolved, if their mother would spend it
For what she thought best, they would get her to send it
Where she thought it would do the most good.
MUSIC OF THE CRICKETS.
Where all in sound and sight,
Declares that nature does not know,
Or do a thing aright.
To granite wall, and tower, and dome
My heart could never cling;
Its simple strings are tied to home—
To where the crickets sing.
To run a city race,
Along a human palisade,
That 's ever shifting place.
The bustle, fashion, art and show
Were each a weary thing;
Amid them, I should sigh to go
And hear the crickets sing.
Myself, as now I seem,
But lose my own identity,
And walk, as in a dream;
Or else, with din and crowd oppressed,
I 'd wish for sparrow's wing,
To fly away, and be at rest,
Where free the crickets sing.
A winged and living light,
I would not give for all the gas,
That spoils their city sight.
Not all the pomp and etiquette
Of citizen or king,
Shall make my rustic heart forget
The song, the crickets sing.
Their figures tame and faint,
To my wild bird, and brook, and tree,
Without a touch of paint.
And from the sweetest instrument
Of pipe, or key, or string,
I 'd turn away, and feel content
To hear the crickets sing.
That 's beaming through the bough
Of yon high elm, or play the tune,
That sounds beneath it now?
Not all the silver of the mine,
Nor human power could bring
Another moon like her to shine,
Or make a cricket sing.
Their plaintive strains by night,
They tell us that, from vale and hill,
The summer takes her flight.
'T would be a mournful thing,
To think of fading leaf and flower;
And hear the crickets sing.
Our eye, when thought can range
Through time and space, and fly to him,
Who is without a change?
For he, who meted out the year,
Will give another spring:
He rolls at once the shining sphere,
And makes the cricket sing.
The summer leaves away,
If cold and silent be the lips
That breathed and moved to-day,
The time I 've passed with nature's God
Will cause no spirit sting,
Though I 've adored him from the sod
Whereon the crickets sing.
CHILDHOOD'S DREAM.
As it passed on the turf by my dear native stream,
Where I slept from my play, while the wind tossed my hair,
Till its ringlets, unbound, clasped the violets there.
By the calm sinking sun, and the fall of the dew,
When, refreshing as light, and as dew to the flower
O'er my young spirit came the blest dream of that hour!
With the perfumes it swept from the bloom of the trees,
As my eyes gently closed; but the vision that stole
Through my fancy's green bowers, come no more to my soul!
From the young flowers I crushed, while they pillowed my head;
And like them, when they flew on the wings of the air,
They are gone, and have left not a trace to tell where!
They were pure as the stars, soon to kindle and blaze;
But they 're gone! I have lost the dear dream of that sleep,
As a bright planet drowned in the vast ether deep.
When she found, gently raised, and led home her lost child—
I shall see that loved face by time's stream evermore,
Till I follow her home, where life's dreamings are o'er.
THE FRUIT-TREE BLOSSOM.
Thy form as full and fair—
As rich a fruit shall follow thee,
As if thou hadst denied the bee
The pure and precious gift, that he
Wafts joyous through the air.
As freely round thee now,
As if withheld an hour ago.
Bestowing, thou canst still bestow;
Though, whence thy gifts thou may'st not know,
Or giving, tell me how.
Was hidden in thy heart;
Its witness shall be left behind,
When thou like all thy tender kind,
Thy minutes summed, shalt be resigned
Forever to depart.
Yet soon, I know, to thee
Must come, what happens once to all:—
Thy life will fail, and thou must fall—
Must fade and perish, past recall,
To vanish from the tree.
To pass thy fleeting days,
At work for which thine hours were lent,
In silent, balmy, mild content,
A rich and shining monument
To thee will nature raise.
Awhile in beauty shine;
And speak, through man's admiring eye,
Forbidding every passer by
To wish to live, or dare to die
With object less than thine.
THE PLYMOUTH APPLE DECLINED.
By its generous owner, but thought it not right
To take it, because it had grown on a tree,
That sprang from a seed sown by Peregrine White.
And he, who thus proffered it, had none beside it;
While diffidence checked the words,—“Let us divide it.”
Who drew his first breath in New England—the child,
Whose parents were making to bud and to blow,
With its earliest blossoms, America's wild:
But he with the fruit never questioned me, whether
We might partake of the apple together.
An apple of gold, where his favorites thronged,
Inscribed, “Of the fair, to the fairest of all!”
It was not to me this whole apple belonged:
I thought that to halve it were just about human.
A wish that, unuttered, was strong in my heart;
And from it entire, while averting my eye,
I own I was secretly coveting part;
And had he divided the offering presented,
Preserving one half, I had come off contented.
His wisdom had brought the debate to an end,
Deciding at once, by the edge of his sword,
This contest of kindness between friend and friend:
Yet he with the apple was quite too short-sighted
To see how I might in a half have delighted.
And, if not forbidden the fruit, that he 'll reach
And pluck a fair apple, then cut it in two,
And tell me at once that a half is for each.
Of friendship's best gift how the worth may be lightened
By having it whole, when, if shared, how 't were heightened!
THE HALF APPLE.
Which shows by division such soundness of heart,
I gratefully hold; and acknowledge the care
And kindness of him, who retains t' other part.
The seed taking out to lay cautiously by,
Because it encloses, concealed from my sight,
An emblem of that, which in us cannot die.
If good, will arise in fresh verdure and bloom;
As man's deathless soul seeks the world of its birth,
When what it once dwelt in lies dark in the tomb.
For Nature, its mother, to tenderly rear;
And bright be its blossoms—its fruit fair and sound,
When I and the giver no more shall be here!
Would fain leave behind, in remembrance of me,
At least, be it said that I planted a seed,
That others might gather the fruit from the tree!
THE HORTICULTURIST'S TABLE-HYMN.
That in Paradise grew, ere he lost its possession—
Who breathed in the balm, and reposed in the bowers
Of our garden ancestral, we claim our profession.
And fruits rich and bright
Bless our taste and our sight
As e'er gave our father in Eden delight:
Our fount clear as that, which he drank from, here flows;
Where green grows the myrtle, and blushing the rose.
That earth has her wormwood, her pitfalls, and brambles;
We smile, and go forth her rich gifts to receive,
Where the boughs drop their purple and gold on our rambles.
Untiring and free,
As we work, like the bee,
We bear off a sweet from each plant, shrub, and tree:
Where some gather thorns but to torture the flesh,
Ripe clusters we pluck, and our spirits refresh.
The treasures that Heaven in its vitals hath hidden;
For thus to lock up the fair fruits of our toil
Were bliss half possessed, and a sin all forbidden.
Like morning's first ray,
When it spreads into day,
Our hearts must flow out, until self melts away!
Our joys, in the bosoms around us when sown,
Spring up and bloom out, throwing sweets to our own.
Where He, who has walled it, his glory is shedding:
His smile is its sun; and beholding it thus,
We gratefully feast, while his bounty is spreading.
Our spirits grow bright
As they bathe in his light,
That beams on the board where in joy we unite:
And the sparks, which we take to enkindle our mirth,
Are blessings from heaven showering down on the earth.
Which binds us together, may sadness ne'er blight them,
Till those, who must break from a compact like ours,
Ascend where the ties of the blest reunite them!
At the banquet appear,
Where Life fills the wine-cup, and Love makes it clear;
And Gilead's balm in its freshness shall flow
On the wounds, which the pruning-knife gave us below!
THE WHIP-POOR-WILL.
At yester-eve on hill and dell,
I heard thee of thy sorrows tell;
And, as the dews distil,
Again, amid this twilight gray,
I hear thee pour thy solemn lay,
With only one sad thing to say,
Still crying, “Whip-poor-will.”
That now thy vesper note is heard
And with thy melting, triple word
Thus dropping from thy bill?
How could they rudely whip at thee,
To scare thee from thy native tree,
And send thee moaning back to me
Repeating, “Whip-poor-will?”
To give thy voice this sound of wo,
Which comes so plaintively to show
That they have used thee ill?
Didst thou go through the woods alone,
Where brambly snares had thickly grown
When thou wast taught thy piteous tone
And story, “Whip-poor-will?”
In silence hide thyself away,
To lose the light, the flash, the play
Of sun, and fount, and rill?
And didst thou now steal out, afraid
Of midnight in the coppice shade,
That here thy tender plaint is made
Again, sad Whip-poor-will?
That fitful in the thicket beam,
Perhaps would make poor Willie dream
His foes were round him still.
And in the copse-wood, dark and deep,
A waving flower, or leaflet's sweep
Might startle thee, in troubled sleep
To murmur, “Whip-poor-will!”
A power I might resist in vain,
With mournful joy—with pleasing pain
My inmost soul to thrill.
'T is memory stirs to wet my eye
By waking shades of days gone by,
When first, a child, I heard the cry
So solemn, “Whip-poor-will.”
A spirit! for I cannot see—
I ne'er could catch a glimpse of thee;
The vision form, that might appear,
Wert thou to sight revealed as clear,
As is thy presence to mine ear,
Mysterious Whip-poor-will.
THE AUTUMN ROSE-BUD.
Come forth from thy green leaves, and peep at the sun;
For little he does, in these dull autumn hours,
At height'ning of beauty, or laughing with flowers.
Will give it a blush that no other can raise;
Thy fine silken petals they'll softly unfold,
And fill their pure centre with spices and gold.
But beauty, we know, is the offspring of health;
And health, the fair daughter of freedom, is bright
With feasting on breezes, and drinking the light.
And see what the glad, golden sun is about:
His shafts, should they strike thee, will only impart
A grace to thy form, and a sweet to thy heart.
TO L. A. E. ON HER WEDDING-DAY.
Be with thee before we are ten hours older,
This hasty messenger comes to say,
And bringing its witness,—a pearly folder.
By the light upon Hymen's altar burning,
May signify, to a heart like thine,
“What a leaf to-day in thy life is turning!”
With no sad characters dark or frowning,
In every letter be bright and fair,
To thee and to him thou to-day art crowning.
As long as thou hence shalt remain its owner,
When thou must be at a far remove
From her, memorial of the donor.
The form of a pen, with its top of feather—
A type of the wings that heart and heart
May find, when absent, to fly together.
Harmless and soft as the peaceful turtle;
With an emerald sprig from a branch that grows
On the single stalk of my true green myrtle.
But, ere thy hand is the cord untwining,
The rose will have drooped, or its leaves be shed,
While the myrtle still is freshly shining.
This, “Wednesday, evening, at half past seven,”
And give at the nuptials my holier dower,—
A prayer for a smile on them from Heaven.
TO MRS. H. F. L.
To sit and think of thee,
Is to my heart like manna,
Or balsam from the tree.
It gives them strength to cling;
And then, if pained or bleeding,
It soothes the wound or sting.
The warmest and the best,
'T is sweet to seem revealing
The secrets of my breast.
My bosom, thus beguiled,
Feels every joy is double,
When on it thou hast smiled.
Our first October day;
But we are here together,
Though thou art far away.
I see thy soft black eye—
I fancy thou canst hear me,
And I thy sweet reply.
This moment, where art thou?
What envied eye is nearest,
To look upon thee now?
In spirit, still with thee?
And dost thou find it pleasant
To feel alone with me?
Nor distance, place, nor scene,
The whole and faithful-hearted
Shall ever come between.
Its joys and sorrows cease,
O may we dwell together
In deathless love and peace!
MUSIC.
Within the palace of the King of kings—
A favorite near his throne. In that glad child
Of Love and Joy, he made their spirits one;
And her, the heir to everlasting life!
When his bright hosts would give him highest praise,
They send her forward with her dulcet voice,
To pour their holy rapture in his ear.
When the young earth to being started forth,
Music lay sleeping in a bower of heaven.
A crystal fountain, close beside her, gushed
With living waters; and the sparkling cup
For her pure draught, stood on its emerald brink.
Kissed by the nodding buds, her head reclined
Upon a flowery pillow. At her ear,
The soft leaves whispered. On her half-closed lips
The gentle air strewed spices, wooing them.
Dropped o'er its radiant orb, the long-fringed lid
Veiled the deep inspiration of her eye;
But on her cheek the rose-tint came and went,
At the quick pulse that fluttered in her breast,
And spoke a wakeful spirit. In her sleep,
With one fair hand thrown o'er its silent strings,
Close to her heart she clasped her golden lyre,
To slumber with her, while she fondly dreamed
To numbers yet untried.
A shout of joy from all the sons of God,
Rang through his courts: and then the thrilling call,
“Wake! sister Music, wake, and hail with us,
A new-created sphere!”
She moved among the morning stars, and gave
The birth-song of a world.
With life's first pulse, rolled in its ether bed,
Robed with the sunlight, mantled by the moon,
Or tenderly embraced by stellar rays:
Death, with his pale, cold finger, had not touched
Its beauty then. No stain of guilt was here,
And so, no cloud of sorrow cast a shade,
Or rained its bitter drops on fruit or flower.
As earth, on every side, shone fair to heaven,
Not knowing yet whereto she was ordained,
Music, from her celestial walks looked down,
And thought, how sweetly she could wake the hills,
Sing through the silent forests—in the vales—
Beside the silver waters pour her sounds;
And multiply her numbers by the rocks!
She longed to give it voice to speak to God;
And, being told of her blest ministry,
Bathed in a flood of glory, till her wings
Dripped with effulgence, as they spread, and poised,
And passed the pearly gates in earthward flight.
And scattering voices to its feathered tribes,
As down she hastened to the shining sphere,
The happy angel reached the beauteous earth.
At her electric touch, young nature smiled,
And kindled into rapture; then broke forth
With thousand, thousand songs.
The sea-shells hummed along the vocal shore,
The busy bee, upon his honeyed flower.
Osier and reed became Eolian lyres.
Trees bore sweet minstrels; while rock, hill, and dell
Sang to each other in a joyous round.
Man, that mysterious instrument of God,
When the warm soul of new-descended power
Breathed on his heart-strings, lifted up his voice,
Chanting, “Jehovah!”
While still her home is heaven, Music has ne'er
This darkened world forsaken. She delights,
Though man may lose, or keep the paths of peace,
To soothe, to cheer, to light and warm his heart;
And lends her wings to waft it to the skies.
Drinks off the tear from Sorrow's languid eye—
Tames wild Despair—brings Hope a brighter bloom—
Lulls Hate to rest—Love's ruffled bosom smooths;
Pours honey into many a bitter cup;
And often gives the black and heavy hour
Making that sad one half forget their use.
With holy spell she binds the exile's heart,
And pours her oil upon its hidden wounds.
Kings are her lovers—cottagers her loves:
The hero and the pilgrim walk with her.
Her voice is sweet by cradled infancy,
And from the pillow of the dying saint,
When a glad spirit borrows her light wings
To practise for the skies, ere it unfolds
Its own, and breaks its tenure to the clay.
Music is often drawn to scenes unmeet
For purity like hers; and made to bear
Unhallowed burdens; or, to join in rites
To turpitude in fellest places held.
Yet, like the sun, whose beaming vesture, trailed
O'er all things staining, still defies a stain;
And is at night withdrawn, and girded up,
Warm and untarnished for the morning skies—
She comes unsullied from her baser walks,
Sighs at the darkness, guilt and wo of earth;
Breathes Zion's air, and, warmed with heavenly fire,
Mounts to her glorious home!
The first grand offering of the free, on high,
When to the shore, through Egypt's solemn sea,
And pæans gave to their Deliverer there.
She cheered the wanderers on; and when they crossed
Over old Jordan, to the strong-armed foe,
Still she was with them; and her single breath
Laid the proud Painim's city-walls in dust!
And sipped the dew of Hermon from its flower
Before the Sun of righteousness arose.
Ere God spake through them; and the Prophetess,
To lift the heart's pure gift from her's to Heaven.
Put close, but gently, to his gloomy breast,
Reached the dark spirit there, and laid it still,
Bound by the chords a shepherd minstrel swept.
And since, her countless thousands she has brought
To heaven's mild kingdom, happy captives led,
By those sweet glowing strings of David's lyre.
In strains aerial over Bethlehem poured,
When He, whose brightness is the light of heaven,
To earth descending for a mortal's form,
Laid by his glory, save one radiant mark,
That moved through space, and o'er the infant hung,
He summoned Music to attend him here,
Announcing peace below!
To sweeten that sad supper, and to twine
Her mantle round him, and his few, grieved friends
Ere to the Mount of Olives he went out
So sorrowful.
A sacred pledge, is left to dying man,
Then at his second coming in his power,
Music shall still be with him; and her voice
Sound through the tombs and wake the dead to life!
Poems by Miss H. F. Gould | ||