EDWARD COATE PINKNEY
ITALY.
Know'st thou the land which lovers ought to choose?
Like blessings there descend the sparkling dews;
In gleaming streams the crystal rivers run,
The purple vintage clusters in the sun;
Odors of flowers haunt the balmy breeze,
Rich fruits hang high upon the verdant trees;
And vivid blossoms gem the shady groves
Where bright-plumed birds discourse their careless loves.
Beloved!—speed we from this sullen strand
Until thy light feet press that green shore's yellow sand.
Look seaward thence, and nought shall meet thine eye
But fairy isles like paintings on the sky;
And, flying fast and free before the gale,
The gaudy vessel with its glancing sail;
And waters glittering in the glare of noon,
Or flecked with broken lines of crimson light
When the far fisher's fire affronts the night.
Lovely as loved! towards that smiling shore
Bear we our household gods, to fix for ever more.
It looks a dimple on the face of earth,
The seal of beauty, and the shrine of mirth;
Nature is delicate and graceful there,
The place of genius, feminine and fair;
The winds are awed, nor dare to breathe aloud;
The air seems never to have borne a cloud,
Save where volcanoes send to heaven their curled
And solemn smokes, like altars of the world.
Thrice beautiful! to that delightful spot
Carry our married hearts, and be all pain forgot.
There Art, too, shows, when Nature's beauty palls,
Her sculptured marbles, and her pictured walls;
And there are forms in which they both conspire
To whisper themes that know not how to tire:
The speaking ruins in that gentle clime
Have but been hallowed by the hand of Time,
And each can mutely prompt some thought of flame
—The meanest stone is not without a name.
Then come, beloved!—hasten o'er the sea
To build our happy hearth in blooming Italy.
A HEALTH.
I fill this cup to one made up of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex the seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements and kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that like the air, 't is less of earth than heaven.
Her every tone is music's own, like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they, and from her lips each flows
As one may see the burthen'd bee forth issue from the rose.
Affections are as thoughts to her, the measure of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy, the freshness, of young flowers;
And lonely passions, changing oft, so fill her, she appears
The image of themselves by turns,—the idol of past years!
Of her bright face one glance will trace a picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts a round must long remain,
But memory such as mine of her so very much endears,
When death is nigh, my latest sigh will not be life's, but hers.
I fill this cup to one made up of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex the seeming paragon—
Her health! and would on earth there stood some more of such a frame,
That life might be all poetry, and weariness a name.
SONG.
We break the glass, whose sacred wine
To some beloved health we drain,
Lest future pledges, less divine,
Should e'er the hallow'd toy profane;
And thus I broke a heart that poured
Its tide of feeling out for thee,
In draughts, by after-times deplored,
Yet dear to memory.
But still the old impassion'd ways
And habits of my mind remain,
And still unhappy light displays
Thine image chamber'd in my brain.
And still it looks as when the hours
Went by like flights of singing birds,
On that soft chain of spoken flowers,
And airy gems, thy words.
A PICTURE SONG.
How may this little tablet feign the features of a face,
Which o'er-informs with loveliness its proper share of space;
Or human hands on ivory enable us to see
The charms, that all must wonder at, thou work of gods, in thee!
But yet, methinks, that sunny smile familiar stories tells,
And I should know those placid eyes, two shaded crystal wells;
Nor can my soul, the limner's art attesting with a sigh,
Forget the blood that deck'd thy cheek, as rosy clouds the sky.
They could not semble what thou art, more excellent than fair,
As soft as sleep or pity is, and pure as mountain air;
But here are common, earthly hues, to such an aspect wrought,
That none, save thine, can seem so like the beautiful of thought.
The song I sing, thy likeness like, is painful mimicry
Of something better, which is now a memory to me,
Who have upon life's frozen sea arrived the icy spot,
Where men's magnetic feelings show their guiding task forgot.
The sportive hopes that used to chase their shifting shadows on,
Like children playing in the sun, are gone—for ever gone;
And on a careless, sullen peace, my double-fronted mind,
Like Janus, when his gates are shut, looks forward and behind.
Apollo placed his harp, of old, awhile upon a stone,
Which has resounded since, when struck, a breaking harp string's tone;
And thus my heart, though wholly now from early softness free,
If touch'd, will yield the music yet, it first received of thee.
