An ear to the desponding love-sick lay, Weeping my sorrows with me, who repay But ill the mighty debt of love I owe, Mary, to thee, my sister and my friend.
A TIMID grace sits trembling in her eye, As loath to meet the rudeness of men's sight, Yet shedding a delicious lunar light,
That steeps in kind oblivious ecstasy
The care-crazed mind, like some still melody: Speaking most plain the thoughts which do possess Her gentle sprite: peace, and meek quietness, And innocent loves, and maiden purity: A look whereof might heal the cruel smart Of changed friends, or fortune's wrongs unkind; Might to sweet deeds of mercy move the heart Of him who hates his brethren of mankind. Turned are those lights from me, who fondly yet Past joys, vain loves, and buried hopes regret.
TO JOHN LAMB, ESQ., OF THE SOUTH-SEA HOUSE.
JOHN, you were figuring in the gay career
Of blooming manhood with a young man's joy, When I was yet a little peevish boy—
Though time has made the difference disappear Betwixt our ages, which then seemed so great- And still by rightful custom you retain Much of the old authoritative strain, And keep the elder brother up in state. O! you do well in this. 'Tis man's worst deed To let the "things that have been" run to waste, And in the unmeaning present sink the past: In whose dim glass even now I faintly read Old buried forms, and faces long ago, Which you, and I, and one more, only know.
O! I could laugh to hear the midnight wind, That, rushing on its way with careless sweep, Scatters the ocean waves. And I could weep Like to a child. For now to my raised mind On wings of winds comes wild-eyed Phantasy, And her rude visions give severė delight. O winged bark! how swift along the night Passed thy proud keel! nor shall I let go by Lightly of that drear hour the memory, When wet and chilly on thy deck I stood, Unbonnetted, and gazed upon the flood, Even till it seemed a pleasant thing to die,— To be resolved into the elemental wave, Or take my portion with the winds that rave.
We were two pretty babes, the youngest she, The youngest, and the loveliest far, I ween, And INNOCENCE her name. The time has been, We two did love each other's company;
Time was, we two had wept to have been apart. But when by show of seeming good beguiled, I left the garb and manners of a child, And my first love for man's society, Defiling with the world my virgin heart- My loved companion dropped a tear, and fled, And hid in deepest shades her awful head. Beloved, who shall tell me where thou art— In what delicious Eden to be found- That I may seek thee the wide world around?
In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse Upon the days gone by; to act in thought Past seasons o'er, and be again a child; To sit in fancy on the turf-clad slope,
Down which the child would roll; to pluck gay flowers, Make posies in the sun, which the child's hand (Childhood offended soon, soon reconciled), Would throw away, and straight take up again, Then fling them to the winds, and o'er the lawn Bound with so playful and so light a foot, That the pressed daisy scarce declined her head.
Hard by the house of prayer, a modest roof, And not distinguished from its neighbor-barn, Save by a slender-tapering length of spire, The Grandame sleeps. A plain stone barely tells The name and date to the chance passenger. For lowly born was she, and long had eat, Well-earned, the bread of service:-hers was else A mountain spirit, one that entertained Scorn of base action, deed dishonorable, Or aught unseemly. I remember well Her reverend image; I remember, too,
With what a zeal she served her master's house; And how the prattling tongue of garrulous age Delighted to recount the oft-told tale
Or anecdote domestic. Wise she was, And wondrous skilled in genealogies, And could in apt and voluble terms discourse Of births, of titles, and alliances; Of marriages, and intermarriages; Relationship remote, or near of kin; Of friends offended, family disgraced- Maiden high-born, but wayward, disobeying Parental strict injunction, and regardless Of unmixed blood, and ancestry remote, Stooping to wed with one of low degree. But these are not thy praises; and I
wrong Thy honored memory, recording chiefly Things light or trivial. Better 'twere to tell, How with a nobler zeal, and warmer love, She served her heavenly Master. I have seen That reverend form bent down with age and pain, And rankling malady. Yet not for this Ceased she to praise her Maker, or withdrew Her trust in him, her faith, an humble hope- So meekly had she learned to bear her cross- For she had studied patience in the school Of Christ; much comfort she had thence derived, And was a follower of the NAZARENE.
THE cheerful Sabbath bells, wherever heard, Strike pleasant on the sense, most like the voice Of one, who from the far-off hills proclaims Tidings of good to Zion; chiefly when Their piercing tones fall sudden on the ear Of the contemplant, solitary man,
Whom thoughts abstruse or high have chanced to lure Forth from the walks of men, revolving oft,
And oft again, hard matter, which eludes
And baffles his pursuit-thought-sick and tired Of controversy, where no end appears, No clue to his research, the lonely man Half wishes for society again.
Him, thus engaged, the Sabbath bells salute. Sudden his heart awakes, his ears drink in The cheering music; his relenting soul Yearns after all the joys of social life, And softens with the love of human kind.
FANCY EMPLOYED ON DIVINE SUBJECTS.
THE truant Fancy was a wanderer ever,
A lone enthusiast maid. She loves to walk In the bright visions of empyreal light, By the green pastures, and the fragrant meads, Where the perpetual flowers of Eden blow; By crystal streams, and by the living waters, Along whose margin grows the wondrous tree Whose leaves shall heal the nations; underneath Whose holy shade a refuge shall be found From pain and want, and all the ills that wait On mortal life, from sin and death forever.
FROM broken visions of perturbed rest I wake, and start, and fear to sleep again. How total a privation of all sounds,
Sights, and familiar objects, man, bird, beast,
« PreviousContinue » |