Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

FOOTPATHS.

THE poor man's walk they take away,
The solace of his only day,

Where now, unseen, the flowers are blowing,
And, all unheard, the stream is flowing!

In solitude unbroken,

Where rill and river glide,

The lover's elm, itself a grove,
Laments the absent voice of love;

How bless'd I oft sat there with Fanny,
When tiny Jem and little Annie

Were fairies at my side!

O dew-dropp'd rose! O woodbine !

They close the bowery way, Where oft my father's father stray'd, And with the leaves and sunbeams play'd, Or, like the river by the wild wood, Ran with that river, in his childhood, The gayest child of May!

Where little feet o'er bluebells,

Pursued the sun-bless'd bee,

No more the child-loved daisy hears

The voice of childhood's hopes and fears;

VOL. II.

H

Thrush! never more, by thy lone dwelling,
Where fountain'd vales thy tale are telling,
Will childhood startle thee?

The poor man's path they take away,
His solace on the Sabbath day;
The sick heart's dewy path of roses,

Where day's eye lingers ere it closes!

TO HOFLAND, THE ARTIST.

Go, Bard and Painter! to the desert.

Limn

The mountain's soul, and bid that spirit stay.

So shall thy canvas be a glowing hymn

To God, in his great works; sung every day

By every eye that sees it with the heart,

While age-long years grow grey, and rock-built pomps depart.

ON A HEARTLESS SLANDERER.

"THE unco guid" should pray with tears,
That thou may'st live a thousand years,
To hunt out flaws, and snarl, and laugh,
And then write Virtue's epitaph.

EPIGRAM.

LIFE is short, and time is swift,
Roses fade, and shadows shift;
But the ocean and the river
Rise and fall and flow for ever:
Bard! not vainly heaves the ocean;
Bard! not vainly flows the river;
Be thy song then like their motion.
Blessing now, and blessing ever.

А РОЕТ.

CHILD of the Hopeless! two hearts broke

When thou wast orphan'd here:

They left a treasure in thy breast,

The soul of Pity's tear.

And thou must be-not what thou wilt ;-
Say then, what would'st thou be?
"A Poet!" Oh, if thou would'st steep
Deep thoughts in ecstasy,

Nor poet of the rich be thou,

Nor poet of the poor;

Nor harper of the swarming town,

Nor minstrel of the moor; But be the bard of all mankind, The prophet of all time,

And tempt the saints in heav'n to steal Earth's truth-created rhyme.

Be the Columbus of a world
Where wisdom knows not fear;

The Homer of a race of men

Who need not sword and spear. God in thy heart, and God in them, If thou to men canst show, Thou makest mortals angels here,

Their home a heav'n below.

Upon a rock thou sett'st thy feet, And callest Death thy slave: "Here lies a man!" Eternity Shall write upon thy grave; "A Bard lies here!-O softly tread, Ye never-wearied years!

And bless, O World, a memory

Immortal as thy tears!"

THE SINLESS CAIN.

A BALLAD.

WHAT is that flesh-bound spectre,

Whose thoughts none understand?

The sleeping mastiff heareth

The shunn'd of every land. The spirit in his famish'd eyes, Seems bare to sun and sky; And insolence grows mad with pride, When that sad form comes nigh.

In every clime and country

There lives a man of pain,

Whose nerves, like chords of lightning,

Bring fire into his brain;

To him a whisper is a wound,

A look or sneer a blow;

More pangs he feels in years or months Than dunce-throng'd ages know.

Yet Pity speaks, like Hatred,

Of him, where'er he goes;

As if his soul were marble,

Men polish it with woes.

« ÎnapoiContinuă »