Passed pale and anxious by the sickly lamp,
Till the young poet wins the world at last
To listen to the music long his own?
The crowd attend the statesman's fiery mind
That makes their destiny; but they do not trace
Its struggle, or its long expectancy.
Hard are life's early steps; and, but that youth
Is buoyant, confident, and strong in hope,
Men would behold its threshold, and despair.
She put him on a snow-white shroud,
A chaplet on his head;
And gathered early primroses
To scatter o'er the dead.
She laid him in his little grave
'Twas hard to lay him there,
When spring was putting forth its flowers,
And everything was fair.
She had lost many children-now
The last of them was gone;
And day and night she sat and wept
Beside the funeral stone.
One midnight, while her constant tears
Were falling with the dew,
She heard a voice, and lo! her child
Stood by her weeping too!
His shroud was damp, his face was white;
He said "I cannot sleep;
Your tears have made my shroud so wet,
O, mother, do not weep!"
O, love is strong!-the mother's heart
Was filled with tender fears;
O, love is strong!-and for her child
Her grief restrained its tears.
One eve a light shone round her bed,
And there she saw him stand-
Her infant in his little shroud,
A taper in his hand.
"Lo! mother, see my shroud is dry,
And I can sleep once more!"
And beautiful the parting smile
The little infant wore.
And down within the silent grave
He laid his weary head;
And soon the early violets
Grew o'er his grassy bed.
The mother went her household ways-
Again she knelt in prayer,
And only asked of Heaven its aid
Her heavy lot to bear.
It is the fruit of waking hours
When others are asleep;
When, moaning round the low-thatched roof,
The winds of winter creep.
It is the fruit of summer days
Passed in a gloomy room,
When others are abroad to taste
The pleasant morning bloom.
'Tis given from a scanty store,
And missed while it is given;
'Tis given-for the claims of earth
Are less than those of heaven.
Few, save the poor, feel for the poor;
The rich know not how hard
It is to be of needful food
And needful rest debarred.
Their paths are paths of plenteousness:
They sleep on silk and down,
And never think how heavily
The weary head lies down.
They know not of the scanty meal,
With small pale faces round;
No fire upon the cold, damp hearth,
When snow is on the ground.
They never by their window sit,
And see the gay pass by,
Yet take their weary work again,
Though with a mournful eye.
The rich, they give-they miss it not-
A blessing cannot be
Like that which rests, thou widowed one,
Upon thy gift and thee!
TIME ARRESTING THE CAREER OF PLEASURE.
Stay thee on thy wild career,
Other sounds than mirth's are near;
Spread not those white arms in air;
Fling those roses from thy hair;
Stop awhile those glancing feet;
Still thy golden cymbals' beat;
Ring not thus thy joyous laugh;
Cease that purple cup to quaff;
Hear my voice of warning, hear-
Stay thee on thy wild career!
Youth's sweet bloom is round thee now;
Roses laugh upon thy brow;
Radiant are thy starry eyes;
Spring is in the crimson dyes
O'er which thy dimpled smile is wreathing;
Incense on thy lip is breathing;
Light and Love are round thy soul
But thunder-peals o'er June-skies roll;
Even now the storm is near-
Then stay thee on thy mad career!
Raise thine eyes to yonder sky,
There is writ thy destiny!
Clouds have veiled the new moonlight;
Stars have fallen from their height;
These are emblems of the fate
That waits thee-dark and desolate!
All morn's lights are now thine own,
Soon their glories will be gone;
What remains when they depart?
Faded hope, and withered heart:
Like a flower with no perfume
To keep a memory of its bloom!
Look upon that hour-marked round,
Listen to that fateful sound;
There my silent hand is stealing,
My more silent course revealing;
Wild, devoted PLEASURE, hear-
Stay thee on thy mad career!
Gentlest one, I bow to thee,
Rose-lipped queen of poesy,
Sweet ERATO, thou whose chords
Waken but for love-touched words!
Never other crown be mine
Than a flower-linked wreath of thine;
Green leaves of the laurel tree
Are for bards of high degree;
Better rose or violet suit
With thy votary's softer lute.
Not thine those proud lines that tell
How kings ruled, or heroes fell;
But that low and honey tone
So peculiarly Love's own;
Music such as the night breeze
Wakens from the willow trees;
Such as murmurs from the shell,
Wave-kissed in some ocean cell;
Tales sweet as the breath of flowers,
Such as in the twilight hours
The young Bard breathes; and also thine
Those old memories divine,
Fables Grecian poets sung
When on Beauty's lips they hung,
Till the essenced song became
Like that kiss, half dew, half flame.
Thine each frail and lovely thing,
The first blossoms of the spring:
Violets, ere the sunny ray
Drinks their fragrant life away;
Roses, ere their crimson breast
Throws aside its green moss vest;
Young hearts, or ere toil, or care,
Or gold, has left a world-stain there.
Thine, too, other gifts above,
Every sign and shape of love-
Its first smile, and its first sigh,
Its hope, its despondency,
Its joy, its sorrow-all belong
To thy dear delicious song.
Fair ERATO, Vowed to thee,
If a lute like mine may be
Offered at thy myrtle shrine,
Lute and heart and song are thine.
Broken be my treasured lute,
Be its every number mute,
Ere a single chord should waken,
If by thee or Love forsaken.
Gentlest one, I bow to thee,
Rose-lipped queen of poesy!
A star has left the kindling sky
A lovely northern light;
How many planets are on high,
But that has left the night.
I miss its bright familiar face,
It was a friend to me;
Associate with my native place,
And those beyond the sea.
It rose upon our English sky,
Shone o'er our English land,
And brought back many a loving eye,
And many a gentle hand.
It seemed to answer to my thought,
It called the past to mind,
And with its welcome presence brought
All I had left behind.
The voyage it lights no longer, ends
Soon on a foreign shore;
How can I but recall the friends
That I may see no more?
Fresh from the pain it was to part-
How could I bear the pain?
Yet strong the omen in my heart
That says-We meet again.
Meet with a deeper, dearer love;
For absence shows the worth
Of all from which we then remove,
Friends, home, and native earth.
Thou lovely polar star, mine eyes
Still turned the first on thee,
Till I have felt a sad surprise
That none looked up with me.
But thou hast sunk upon the wave,
Thy radiant place unknown;
I seem to stand beside a grave,
And stand by it alone.
Farewell! ah, would to me were given
A power upon thy light!
What words upon our English heaven
Thy loving rays should write!
Alluding to the North Star, which, in her voyage to Africa, she had nightly watched till it sank below the horizon. These were the last verses she ever wrote.
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