Madmoments: or First Verseattempts By a Bornnatural. Addressed to the Lightheaded of Society at Large, by Henry Ellison |
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ON HEARING AN ELDTIME SONG. |
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| II. |
 | Madmoments: or First Verseattempts |  |
ON HEARING AN ELDTIME SONG.
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Thou good old song that like a gleamOf sunshine comest on my Heart,
From good old Times, that like a Dream
Are past, yet of our life a part!
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Thou good old song of good old Times,Oftcarolled 'neath the Greenwoodtree,
Or mingled with the Evening-chimes
That told of Villagerevelry!
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Thou good old song, oft sung beneathThe Maypole's nighforgotten ring,
By merry lips, that lent their breath
To thee with an heartwelcoming!
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Thou living voice from olden times,That like a spirit travellest on
From lip to lip, from Heart to Heart
Linking our own to those long gone.
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'Tis with a throbbing heart I hearThy wellknown voice of harmonies,
Float, like past boyhood, on my ear,
With old ancestral memories!
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Oh! thou art as an unseen soulThat communes with us, till we be
Quite space-and-timefree, blended all
With thy deep Essence lovingly.
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Thou art a stirring note blown onImagination's magic horn,
But out of date in these dull days,
When Faith is of her visions shorn.
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And ever as that note I hear,My Soul with its far echoes shakes,
It strikes not on the claycoarse ear,
But a far deeper sense awakes!
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And as I list, hark! I do hearThe wartramp of the fireeyed steed,
The shout on some old Battlefield,
Where Right once wrought some glorious deed.
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Another breath on Fancy's horn,Whose stops are manifold as thought,
And to my mindseye, fresh as Morn,
Another scene is instant brought:
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Oh! I do see a forestgladeWhere antlered Deer steal thro' old oaks,
And huntinghorns in echoes fade,
With woodman's quick, treefelling strokes.
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I see on 'yon green oakgirt knollWhose Top one Kingtree shadows o'er
With ampler leafage, a blithe band
Of bowmen stout, a score or more.
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And they are there with horn and bow,Staunchwinded hounds and hearts as light
As the green leaves, thro' which e'en now
The Springwind breathes its gentle might.
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And they are dressed in forestgreen,Such as the Sherwood clan once wore,
And gliding now the boughs between,
Lo! they are gone for evermore!
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Gone, gone, and faded far awayInto that forest dim and vast;
Preserved from the rude axe's sway,
And still kept sacred to the Past!
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Oh Fancy! but for thy good ear,Their merry songs were heard no more,
And but for thy good eye, we ne'er
Should glimpses catch of days of yore!
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But thou dost love to fly awayFrom these harsh scenes that round us lie,
With sunshine of a bygone Day
To chear thy heart and glad thine eye!
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Thou hast bright visions of the Past,And spite of axe, and steam, and plough,
Thy woods and landscapes still outlast
All change that Time effects below!
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With fairer hues than those of TruthThy sunny scenes embathed arise;
And fixed in bright, unfading youth
Return to cheer our agedim eyes!
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Another Note! and other Scenes,Like Summerclouds o'er waters pass,
The Shadows which far Ages fling,
O'ersweeping the Soul's Magicglass.
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That Mirror where forgotten ThingsTheir faded Forms oft body forth,
Gazing on which our Thoughts take wings,
And learn, like newfledged Birds, their Worth.
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Things seen are beautiful 'tis true,But those unseen are fairer still,
For they are clothed with other Hue
Than those the Weekday-Eye which fill!
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Distance makes sweetest Melody,And to old Songs which thus have come
From haunted Eld, with Meanings high,
The Heart gives an enduring Home.
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These, with the Voices of our Youth,Are on our Lips a spell of Beauty,
A Form wherein Eternal Truth
Still charms the Heart to Love and Duty.
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They tell of Things above the ReachOf chance and change, and that the Heart,
When it beats truly, can the Breath
Of Immortality impart!
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Thoughts that pass on from sire to Son,Thro' th'universal heart undying,
Are beams of Truth's Eternal Sun,
Which gather strength thus flying.
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Such thoughts still live in ye, ye Songs,Ye old heartcherished songs of yore,
Heartgraved ye need not fear the wrongs,
That Time or Change can bring your Lore.
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Ye cannot perish! from the dustOf our forefather's graves ye speak
With their own voices, and a trust
Ye bring us which we dare not break.
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The seeds of mighty thoughts lie hidYe old heartcoined songs in ye,
Ye are Time's Voices, and ye bid
Old truths speak to posterity.
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Ye cannot perish! for ye breatheFrom each old grassgrown battlefield,
Ye are like spirits, and beneath
Our Feet the Caves your Echo yield.
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Ye cannot perish! for ye sighRound each grey timeworn castletower,
Where freedom's champions doomed to die,
Have left each stone a spell of power!
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Ye reach us from those bygone YearsLike Voices from another World,
The Language of immortal Fears
And Hopes, whose Banner long is furled!
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Ye cannot perish! they who chauntYour strains, do feel an inward might,
As if tenthousand hearts did haunt
Our heart, and joined their pulses with it!
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And tho' the Voice of man were muteIn some degenerate land of shame,
The winds would whisper ye, and bruit
Your memories, like an airfanned flame.
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Ye blessed songs, heartmusic sweetTo those who freedom's Voice do know,
There is no minstrelsy so meet
To stir the soul with Virtue's glow.
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With ye at daybreak, the bold SwissClimbing the sunlit mountainheight,
Pours forth in orisons his bliss,
And drinks into his soul delight.
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He learns ye from his mother's tongue,Thus intertwined ye grow with all
Of good or bright, in Truth or Song,
That can his Afterlife befall.
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And like sweet dew, your memoryFalls on his Heart in Afterdays,
To keep it still from blight, with high
And holy thoughts to cheer his ways.
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He hears ye in the woodstream call,He lists ye in the winds above,
And thundering from the waterfall,
Ye speak of Liberty and Love!
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And when a tyrant would enchain,He sings his old Songs lustily,
And with these on his heart and lip,
He feels the will and strength to die!
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Ye song's; ye are a potent spellAnd in our hearts as 'twere
The breath of holy Oracle,
A creed which Love has hallowed there.
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Blessings be with ye, and high praise,For oldtimessake, the Times of Song,
The homely beauty of those days,
Of simple Speech and Feelings strong!
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From Heart to Heart, ye speak for aye,And with Love's soullinked chain ye bind
Past unto Present, and to day
With comeing times, one heart, one mind!
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From ye we learn humanity,And fellowcreature cares and fears;
And snatch from self to sympathy
With nobler things of bygone years.
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Then be ye by the baby sungScarcelisping on his mother's arm;
And by the oldman to whose tongue
His Cradlesongs have still a charm.
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Oh! be ye sung by young and oldFrom castlehall to lowly bower,
On Newyearsnight let tales be told
Of olden times, by Rich and Poor.
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Thus shall our Hearts hold intercourse,In thoughts which hallow equally
Both high and low, which are a source
Of Harvests rich in sympathy.
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For these, alas! are selfish days,And the poorman hath nought to glean
Where Avarice his sickle lays
And Pride's heartcrushing step hath been.
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Some good old things have passed awayThat could not bettered be by new,
And hearts are severed now-a-day,
Which might be lovelinked, kind and true.
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Esteem which closecements all ranks,Without which law is mockery,
Hath fled; rank selfishness o'erbanks,
And men look on with evil eye.
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Gold is the measure of all worth,And what this yellow dust cant buy,
Is cast aside or trod to Earth
Tho' 'twere an angel's dowery!
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The Altarflame of that old cause,The holy cause of better days
And nobler minds, who knew that Laws
Are worthless, when they from the praise
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Of God and Truth are turned, to wealthAnd moneygrasping Ends — That flame
Is flickering, gone its strength and health,
Its holy heat no more the same!
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But in its stead, is kindled nowA smokedimmed and unholy light,
To a foul Idolgod, whose low
Clayworshippers are soulless quite.
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Selfseekers offering to this God,As pearl to swine, all feelings high,
Not illnamed «Wealth» whose hoofs have trod
Down, Honor, Love, and Liberty.
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And left the marks, so deep and strong,Of his soulsoiling, bestial Tread
In the whole Nation's Heart, that wrong
If gilt, of worth may take the lead!
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Woe unto ye, my countrymen!The soil into your Souls hath eat;
Ye have become I say, a den
Of moneychangers in God's very seat!
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Woe unto thee! my Motherland,That such disnatured sons be thine,
Their shame, e'en as a firebrand,
Shall search thy womb, thy Glory tine!
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That wellearned Fame which with so brightAnd Rainbowgrasp of splendor shone
Above thy Brow, forsakes our sight,
Its promise fades, already gone.
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The Echo of a coming woe,A Voice from out the wilderness,
Is on thine ear, oh! bow thee low,
Repent thee, that thy God may bless!
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Oh put this leprous curse awayThat plaguelike cleaveth to thy limbs;
Oh teach thy lips, hearttuned, to pray,
Hard falls has he who rashly climbs.
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Push back the brimming cup of Sin,Thou drunk with worse than wine! which now
Is at thy lips; thus shalt thou win
Pardon above and Hope below!
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Oh turn ye to the good old causeOf wealthdespising lowliness,
And make in your own hearts your laws,
With pure thoughts for sole witnesses.
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Oh turn unto the days yore,When Faith her Martyrsons could name,
And Liberty's untainted Lore,
From Heart to Heart, passed as a Flame.
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Oh turn unto the days when FaithCould build Cathedralpiles thro' Love,
And Hosts therein, as with one breath,
Their true heartoffering sent above!
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Oh turn unto the days of old,When unreproved and free,
Old songs were sung, old tales were told,
And Hall and Bower rang to their glee.
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Turn ye unto the times I say,When noble thoughts were welcome more
To English Ears, than at this day
Vile clinking Gold by knaves told o'er!
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Oh turn ye to the Householdlaws,The Firesidelaws of Peace and Love,
Where Wisdom feeds her little ones,
And fashions them for Him above!
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Oh turn unto our Shakespear's Page,And read of Harry's Chivalry,
Of gallant deeds, which are a gage
For like unto Posterity.
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Oh then shall Freedom on Time's LyreStrike with a willing hand the strain
Of oldendays, and Hampden's fire,
And Milton's tongue be heard again!
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Then Faith shall have her martyrnames,Tho' not firetested be their worth,
And patient Charity, who tames
Old hatreds, give to Love new birth!
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Then Freedom's bright Electric ChainShall stretch o'er Hamlet, Town, and Tower,
And good, old Songs be heard again
In knightly Hall, in Cot, and Bower!
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Then too my Fatherland, thy fameWith Rainbowbreadth once more shall rise,
Scattering the Storms thro' which it came,
Like Dawn unto long Watcher's eyes!
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And thus, when thou must sink againWithin thine own eternal Sea,
The Guardianangels still their strain
Shall sing, and hail thee, «bless'd and free.»
| Madmoments: or First Verseattempts | |