There groups of merry children played,
There youths and maidens dreaming strayed;
O precious hours! O golden prime,
And affluence of love and time!
Even as a miser counts his gold,
Those hours the ancient time-piece told,—
"For ever-never!
From that chamber, clothed in white,
The bride came forth on her wedding-night;
There, in that silent room below,
The dead lay in his shroud of snow;
And in the hush that followed the prayer,
Was heard the old clock on the stair,—
"For ever-never!
Never for ever!"
All are scattered now and fled,
Some are married, some are dead;
And when I ask, with throbs of pain,
"Ah! when shall they all meet again ?"
As in the days long since gone by,
The ancient time-piece makes reply,-
"For ever-never!
Never here, for ever there,
Where all parting, pain, and care,
And death, and time shall disappear,—
For ever there, but never here!
The horologe of Eternity
Sayeth this incessantly,-
For ever-never!
Never for ever!"
I SHOT an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where ;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.
I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?
Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.
Lo! in the painted oriel of the West,
Whose panes the sunken sun incarnadines,
Like a fair lady at her casement, shines
The evening star, the star of love and rest!
And then anon she doth herself divest
Of all her radiant garments, and reclines
Behind the sombre screen of yonder pines,
With slumber and soft dreams of love op-
pressed.
Oh my beloved, my sweet Hesperus!
My morning and my evening star of love!
My best and gentlest lady! even thus,
As that fair planet in the sky above,
Dost thou retire unto thy rest at night,
And from thy darkened window fades the light.
THOU Comest, Autumn, heralded by the rain, With banners, by great gales incessant fanned, Brighter than brightest silks of Samarcand, And stately oxen harnessed to thy wain! Thou standest, like imperial Charlemagne, Upon thy bridge of gold; thy royal hand Outstretched with benedictions o'er the land, Blessing the farms through all thy vast domain!
Thy shield is the red harvest-moon, suspended So long beneath the heaven's o'erhanging
Thy steps are by the farmer's prayers attended;
Like flames upon an altar shine the sheaves; And, following thee, in thy ovation splendid, Thine almoner, the wind, scatters the golden leaves !
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