Malvern Hills :: :: University of Virginia Library

GATHER fast, ye clouds of night!
Let no star this deed behold!
Be it blotted from the light!
Be it but to demons told!
Thy honor'd Bards, O Cambria fair!
Whose harps, so oft, have lull'd thy care,
And taught thy sons, to pity prone,
To make another's pang their own,
O friends revered! O brethren dear!
For you I shed the fervent tear!
In the hour supreme of woe,
Iron war hath laid you low!—
While I am left, forlorn, alone,
To heave the sigh, and pour the groan!

II.

Masters of the sacred lyre!
Spirits bathed in Fancy's fire!
On daring pinion born to ride;
Who only sojourn'd here awhile
Sorrow's children to beguile
With the songs to heaven allied:

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When shall I again withdraw
My jarring chords to learn of ye?
When listen, lost in silent awe,
To your towering harmony?
In happier days, for ever gone!
Which memory loves to linger on,
Mid glittering hopes, and sunny dreams,
We haunted oft the dashing streams;
Or, wilds remote from human eye,
When lightnings flash'd athwart the sky,
And thunders, with long-lengthen'd sound,
In ghastly dread, the fearful bound:
Or the soul-enchanting mountains,
Stately rivers, hallow'd fountains,
While night, in panoply and prime,
Marshall'd her starry hosts sublime:
Hoary fathers! spirits pure!
To heaven's selectest treasures free,
Earth your like shall never see,
While the sun and moon endure!
Meads, and hills, and torrents rude,
Mourn your widow'd solitude!
Who shall now your praises tell!
They are dead who loved you well!
O my country! Cambria dear!
In deep silence drop the tear,
For never more at closing eve
Shall thy ancient woods receive,
While radiance lingers in the sky,
Thy loved, thy bards' sweet melody!
On the lonely willow-tree,
Shall their drooping harps be found;
And the winds that round them flee,
Wake, unbeard, the solemn sound!

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III.

O, that in Oblivion's tide,
I could plunge, and wash away
The memory of this evil day,
And its deeds of darkness hide.
Though the mortal groan hath past;
Though is hush'd the raging blast;
Though my brethren all are slain,
Still, upon my burning brain,
The image rests! the shrieks arise!
The beaming spear affrights my eyes!
The hand is raised! the knee is bent!
And “Mercy!” throngs the firmament.
Why, in this vindictive hour,
Was I spared, a wretched end!
To behold the bloody shower
Thus, on Mona's Bards, descend!

IV.

Sons of innocence and song!
Shall o'er your fate no lofty spirits weep?—
Cambria shall bewail you long
When these weary eye-balls sleep!
While succeeding ages roll,
You shall move the feeling soul!
To this spot, thus holy made,
To this lone, and peaceful shade,
From a callous world, and proud,
Cambria's better sons shall crowd;—
They, upon this mound, shall stand,
And, whilst their labouring hearts expand,
They shall drop a tear for you,
And, faultering, cry,—“Sweet bards, adieu!”

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V.

Grey my lock, and dim mine eye,
On another state I gaze!
The end of time, with me, is nigh,
Yet, in these my parting days,
Bitter is the cup of woe,
Which I must drink before I go!
The world, to me, is blank and dead,
All its vagrant joys are fled;
False and fleeting lights they gave,
Brief as the sun-illumined wave.
Confusion thickens! mists abound!
Forms, mysterious, gather round!
Like the stars that seem to fly,
When the clouds are sailing by,
All things swim before my sight!
Dreams of dread! and visions bright!
Oh! what lawless revels reign
In my strain'd, and labouring brain!
I see no home beneath the sky!
I hear no harp's sweet minstrelsy!
I view no bard a brother made,
All beneath the turf are laid!—
I am left, and left alone,
To heave the sigh, and pour the groan!
Hence, of happiness bereaved,
Still pursuing, still deceived!—
From the storms that round me rave,
There is a refuge in the grave!

VI.

Ah! a foe, for mortal fray,
Starts forth, in terrible array!
All must die! our earthly span
Oppress'd with ample grief is found;

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But tenfold wretched is the man
Who dies with none but strangers round.
No friend to bid his anguish cease;
When terrors rise, to whisper peace;
To hang upon his parting breath,
And smooth the rugged road to death:
Whose head is laid, where all must lie,
Without a tear, without a sigh.
Pity near, when we complain,
Sorrow loses half its pain;
The feeling heart is not for me;
Mine is lonely misery!
They who would have rush'd to share
All my joy, and all my care,
(Their memory blessings rest upon!)
To their long, long home are gone!

VII.

Hope, farewell! thine end I view!
Pleasure! take my last adieu!
I, where tempests rave around,
In a lonely bark am bound:
From care to care, with none to save,
Toss'd, like a locust, on the wave.
As fix'd as repose, and as earnest as fear,
I will gaze at the sky, till the planets appear;
As passive my spirit, as dreary and chill
As the cloud, which December drives whither he will.
The past recedes, new prospects shine;
Farewell, O earth! O harp divine!
Soon must I attune my ear
To other cadence, soft and clear,
To songs that suit the upper sky,
To strains of immortality!

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VIII.

God of majesty, and might!
Let thy winged lightning fly!
Let thy thunder-bolts alight
On the monster chieftains nigh!
At this hour of tears and sighs,
Hark! their horrid laughters rise!
Scorn'd of every heart and clime,
May they wither in their prime!
Hope, the balm of human care,
May they barter for despair!
May thy mercy, Judge of all!
Never to their souls extend,
But confusion on them fall!
And perdition, without end!
Anguish, like a flaming dart
Deeper let it pierce their heart!
And, when on life's tempestuous brink,
Whilst her wormwood dregs they drink,
Let them pass the torrent wild,
Not like Virtue's peaceful child,—
By their own uplifted hand,
May they perish from the land!
Or, Justice, with remorseless fang,
Tear them from these happy skies,
And the still-increasing pang
Be their worm, that never dies!—
Oh! I err! the storm within
My heart hath hurried on to sin!—
This sudden tumult in my vein
Hath dragg'd me back to earth again.
Anger! child of hell! away!
I will look to heaven, and say,
God of mercy! o'er the past,
Thy forgiving mantle cast!—

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Now let me to the forests fly—
There to sorrow—there to die!