University of Virginia Library

When from the southern land I came,
Pale as the lips I kissed in death,
A stranger to the voice of fame,
The spell of praise, the laurel wreath,
With my heart's sorrows on my brow,
And desolation in my soul,
While backward lay a waste of woe,
And fear before, to read the scroll
The spirit of my doom unfolded
With calm despair, that recks not how
The features of our fate are moulded,
So he fulfil his awful vow;—
I dreamed not then, thou gentle one!
That ever earthly shape again
Could charm a heart so long undone,
And picture on the brow of pain
The bright, though shadowy form of bliss,
That changeful as the rainbow's hues,
Or April green, hath come to this
Outbreathing of the heart's cold dews;
The overflow of feelings wrought
Up to the madness of delight—
The torrent of long gathered thought,
The meteor of fate's darkest night.

But when we met, thy nameless grace,
Thine eye, that floated in its light,
The heart's high heaven in thy sweet face,
Thy voice, that came like sounds by night,
O'er the blue waters faintly gleaming,
When earth is green, and soft, and still,
And heaven above serenely dreaming,
Each angel on his own star-hill—
All that clung round thee at that hour,
(Alas! they cling around thee yet!)
When all the thoughts of years have power,
And we can ne'er in life forget—
Far backward as I trace the scene,
They rise before my heart and eye,
To tell how blest I might have been—
Now, 't were a blessed boon to die.

Why was I born to be the bane
Of all I love as genius loves?
Ah! 't is enough, my own heart's pain,
That seeks the lonesome hilly groves,
And finds a solace and a joy,
Revealments of a happier lot,
While musing, 'neath the deep blue sky,
On all that have been, but are not.
But, 't is my evil fate to link
Spirits with mine, for woe alone,
And bid the holy-hearted drink
The bann'd cup of enjoyment gone;
As the dark nightshade from the sun
Drinks light to feed its poison leaves,
So my heart looks on all that's done,
With that strange passion which bereaves
The hearts of others of their mirth—
To them, however vain, a wreath
Of joy—their sole reward on earth—
Though unto me the masque of death.
And thus it hath been from the time
My foot hath trod this desert land,
Though not a tinge of all earth's crimes
Hath soiled my heart, or stained my hand.
I know not why it thus should be;
My heart loves peace and gentle things,
And oft, in days when life was free,
I prayed some spirit would give me wings,
That I might look on every land,
And love each thing I looked upon.
My soul was pure, my feelings bland—
Alas for me! that time hath gone.
Yet—even yet—I bear not hate
To ought that breathes the breath of heaven;
But there 's with me an evil fate,
To which my spirit hath been given,
And 't is unmeet that I should love,
Since all I love death garners up;
No! be it mine alone to prove
The dregs of fate's unhallowed cup.

My father died ere I could tell
The love my young heart felt for him:
My sister like a blossom fell;
Her cheek grew cold, her blue eyes dim,
Just as the hallowed hours came by,
When she was dearest unto me;
And vale and stream and hill and sky
Were beautiful as Araby.
And, one by one, the friends of youth
Departed to the land of dreams;
And soon I felt that friends, in sooth,
Were few as flowers by mountain streams;
And solitude came o'er me then,
And early I was taught to treasure
Lone thoughts in glimmering wood and glen,—
Now they are mine in utmost measure.
But boyhood's sorrows, though they leave
Their shadows on the spirit's dial,
Cannot by their deep spell bereave—
They herald but a darker trial:
And such 't is mine e'en now to bear
In the sweet radiance of thine eye,
And 't is the wildness of despair
To paint vain love, that cannot die.
Yet thus it must be—like the flower,
That sheds amid the dusky night
The rays it drank at midday hour,
My spirit pours abroad its light,
When all the beauty and the bloom,
The blessedness of love have gone,
And left the darkness of the tomb
Upon the glory of its throne.
The hour hath come—it cannot part—
Deterring pride—one hurried deed
Hath fixed its seal upon my heart,
And ever it must throb and bleed,
Till life, and love, and anguish o'er,
The spirit soars to its first birth,
And meets on heaven's own peaceful shore
The heart it loved too well on earth.

Clara! I never named to thee
The thoughts that thronged my bosom erst,
Though, with a wild idolatry,
I loved thee, lost one! from the first;
And now it were a deadly wrong
To thee, and to thy honest fame,
Save in a sad and dirgelike song,
To speak in love thy cherished name;
But here—as from my bosom flow
Tears of despair o'er what is gone,
Thou canst but listen to such woe,
As be not thine, beloved one!
For thou canst feel the burning power
Of passion baffled in its range,
And know that hearts, in one brief hour,
Meet—blend beyond all hope of change.
Adieu! be thine the seraph's task,
To hush the murmurings of despair,
But Clara! never, never ask,
What are the sorrows that I bear.
It were unholy now to tell—
It were a blight—a blasting curse—
To thee a mockery—me a hell—
Content thee—earth could bring nought worse:
Lips sealed, when the full heart is breaking—
Eyes never closed on heaven denied—
The lingering pause—the last forsaking—
These are thy triumphs—sceptred Pride!