Chapter 5

There, at morn's rosy birth, Thou lookest meekly through the kindling air, And eve, that round the earth Chases the day, beholds thee watching there; There noontide finds thee, and the hour that calls The shapes of polar flame to scale heaven's azure walls.

Alike, beneath thine eye, The deeds of darkness and of light are done; High towards the star-lit sky Towns blaze--the smoke of battle blots the sun-- The night-storm on a thousand hills is loud-- And the strong wind of day doth mingle sea and cloud.

On thy unaltering blaze The half-wrecked mariner, his compass lost, Fixes his steady gaze, And steers, undoubting, to the friendly coast; And they who stray in perilous wastes, by night, Are glad when thou dost shine to guide their footsteps right.

And, therefore, bards of old, Sages, and hermits of the solemn wood, Did in thy beams behold A beauteous type of that unchanging good, That bright eternal beacon, by whose ray The voyager of time should shape his heedful way.

THE LAPSE OF TIME.

Lament who will, in fruitless tears, The speed with which our moments fly; I sigh not over vanished years, But watch the years that hasten by.

Look, how they come,--a mingled crowd Of bright and dark, but rapid days; Beneath them, like a summer cloud, The wide world changes as I gaze.

What! grieve that time has brought so soon The sober age of manhood on! As idly might I weep, at noon, To see the blush of morning gone.

Could I give up the hopes that glow In prospect like Elysian isles; And let the cheerful future go, With all her promises and smiles?

The future!--cruel were the power Whose doom would tear thee from my heart. Thou sweetener of the present hour! We cannot--no--we will not part.

Oh, leave me, still, the rapid flight That makes the changing seasons gay, The grateful speed that brings the night, The swift and glad return of day;

The months that touch, with added grace, This little prattler at my knee, In whose arch eye and speaking face New meaning every hour I see;

The years, that o'er each sister land Shall lift the country of my birth, And nurse her strength, till she shall stand The pride and pattern of the earth:

Till younger commonwealths, for aid, Shall cling about her ample robe, And from her frown shall shrink afraid The crowned oppressors of the globe.

True--time will seam and blanch my brow-- Well--I shall sit with aged men, And my good glass will tell me how A grizzly beard becomes me then.

And then should no dishonour lie Upon my head, when I am gray, Love yet shall watch my fading eye, And smooth the path of my decay.

Then haste thee, Time--'tis kindness all That speeds thy winged feet so fast: Thy pleasures stay not till they pall, And all thy pains are quickly past.

Thou fliest and bear'st away our woes, And as thy shadowy train depart, The memory of sorrow grows A lighter burden on the heart.

SONG OF THE STARS.

When the radiant morn of creation broke, And the world in the smile of God awoke, And the empty realms of darkness and death Were moved through their depths by his mighty breath, And orbs of beauty and spheres of flame From the void abyss by myriads came,-- In the joy of youth as they darted away, Through the widening wastes of space to play, Their silver voices in chorus rang, And this was the song the bright ones sang:

"Away, away, through the wide, wide sky, The fair blue fields that before us lie,-- Each sun with the worlds that round him roll, Each planet, poised on her turning pole; With her isles of green, and her clouds of white, And her waters that lie like fluid light.

"For the source of glory uncovers his face, And the brightness o'erflows unbounded space; And we drink as we go the luminous tides In our ruddy air and our blooming sides: Lo, yonder the living splendours play; Away, on our joyous path, away!

"Look, look, through our glittering ranks afar, In the infinite azure, star after star, How they brighten and bloom as they swiftly pass! How the verdure runs o'er each rolling mass! And the path of the gentle winds is seen, Where the small waves dance, and the young woods lean.

"And see where the brighter day-beams pour, How the rainbows hang in the sunny shower; And the morn and eve, with their pomp of hues, Shift o'er the bright planets and shed their dews; And 'twixt them both, o'er the teeming ground, With her shadowy cone the night goes round!

"Away, away! in our blossoming bowers, In the soft air wrapping these spheres of ours, In the seas and fountains that shine with morn, See, Love is brooding, and Life is born, And breathing myriads are breaking from night, To rejoice, like us, in motion and light.

"Glide on in your beauty, ye youthful spheres, To weave the dance that measures the years; Glide on, in the glory and gladness sent, To the farthest wall of the firmament,-- The boundless visible smile of Him, To the veil of whose brow your lamps are dim."

A FOREST HYMN.

The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave, And spread the roof above them,--ere he framed The lofty vault, to gather and roll back The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood, Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down, And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks And supplication. For his simple heart Might not resist the sacred influences Which, from the stilly twilight of the place, And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound Of the invisible breath that swayed at once All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed His spirit with the thought of boundless power And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore Only among the crowd, and under roofs That our frail hands have raised? Let me, at least, Here, in the shadow of this aged wood, Offer one hymn--thrice happy, if it find Acceptance in His ear.

Father, thy hand Hath reared these venerable columns, thou Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun, Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze, And shot towards heaven. The century-living crow, Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died Among their branches, till, at last, they stood, As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark, Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults, These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride Report not. No fantasting carvings show The boast of our vain race to change the form Of thy fair works. But thou art here--thou fill'st The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds That run along the summit of these trees In music;--thou art in the cooler breath That from the inmost darkness of the place Comes, scarcely felt; the barky trunks, the ground, The fresh moist ground, are all instinct with thee. Here is continual worship;--nature, here, In the tranquillity that thou dost love, Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around, From perch to perch, the solitary bird Passes: and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs, Wells softly forth and visits the strong roots Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left Thyself without a witness, in these shades, Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak-- By whose immovable stem I stand and seem Almost annihilated--not a prince, In all that proud old world beyond the deep, Ere wore his crown as loftily as he Wears the green coronal of leaves with which Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower With scented breath, and look so like a smile, Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould, An emanation of the indwelling Life, A visible token of the upholding Love, That are the soul of this wide universe.

My heart is awed within me when I think Of the great miracle that still goes on, In silence, round me--the perpetual work Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed For ever. Written on thy works I read The lesson of thy own eternity. Lo! all grow old and die--but see again, How on the faltering footsteps of decay Youth presses--ever gay and beautiful youth In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees Wave not less proudly that their ancestors Moulder beneath them. Oh, there is not lost One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet, After the flight of untold centuries, The freshness of her far beginning lies And yet shall lie. Life mocks the idle hate Of his arch enemy Death--yea, seats himself Upon the tyrant's throne--the sepulchre, And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth From thine own bosom, and shall have no end.

There have been holy men who hid themselves Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave Their lives to thought and prayer, till they outlived The generation born with them, nor seemed Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks Around them;--and there have been holy men Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus. But let me often to these solitudes Retire, and in thy presence reassure My feeble virtue. Here its enemies, The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink And tremble and are still. Oh, God! when thou Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill, With all the waters of the firmament, The swift dark whirlwind that uproots the woods And drowns the villages; when, at thy call, Uprises the great deep and throws himself Upon the continent, and overwhelms Its cities--who forgets not, at the sight Of these tremendous tokens of thy power, His pride, and lays his strifes and follies by? Oh, from these sterner aspects of thy face Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath Of the mad unchained elements to teach Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate In these calm shades thy milder majesty, And to the beautiful order of thy works Learn to conform the order of our lives.

"OH FAIREST OF THE RURAL MAIDS."

Oh fairest of the rural maids! Thy birth was in the forest shades; Green boughs, and glimpses of the sky, Were all that met thy infant eye.

Thy sports, thy wanderings, when a child, Were ever in the sylvan wild; And all the beauty of the place Is in thy heart and on thy face.

The twilight of the trees and rocks Is in the light shade of thy locks; Thy step is as the wind, that weaves Its playful way among the leaves.

Thine eyes are springs, in whose serene And silent waters heaven is seen; Their lashes are the herbs that look On their young figures in the brook.

The forest depths, by foot unpressed, Are not more sinless than thy breast; The holy peace, that fills the air Of those calm solitudes, is there.

"I BROKE THE SPELL THAT HELD ME LONG."

I broke the spell that held me long, The dear, dear witchery of song. I said, the poet's idle lore Shall waste my prime of years no more, For Poetry, though heavenly born, Consorts with poverty and scorn.

I broke the spell--nor deemed its power Could fetter me another hour. Ah, thoughtless! how could I forget Its causes were around me yet? For wheresoe'er I looked, the while, Was nature's everlasting smile.

Still came and lingered on my sight Of flowers and streams the bloom and light, And glory of the stars and sun;-- And these and poetry are one. They, ere the world had held me long, Recalled me to the love of song.

JUNE.

I gazed upon the glorious sky And the green mountains round, And thought that when I came to lie Within the silent ground, 'Twere pleasant, that in flowery June, When brooks send up a cheerful tune, And groves a joyous sound, The sexton's hand, my grave to make, The rich, green mountain turf should break.

A cell within the frozen mould, A coffin borne through sleet, And icy clods above it rolled, While fierce the tempests beat-- Away!--I will not think of these-- Blue be the sky and soft the breeze, Earth green beneath the feet, And be the damp mould gently pressed Into my narrow place of rest.

There through the long, long summer hours, The golden light should lie, And thick young herbs and groups of flowers Stand in their beauty by. The oriole should build and tell His love-tale close beside my cell; The idle butterfly Should rest him there, and there be heard The housewife bee and humming-bird.

And what if cheerful shouts at noon Come, from the village sent, Or songs of maids, beneath the moon With fairy laughter blent? And what if, in the evening light, Betrothed lovers walk in sight Of my low monument? I would the lovely scene around Might know no sadder sight nor sound.

I know, I know I should not see The season's glorious show, Nor would its brightness shine for me, Nor its wild music flow; But if, around my place of sleep, The friends I love should come to weep, They might not haste to go. Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom, Should keep them lingering by my tomb.

These to their softened hearts should bear The thought of what has been, And speak of one who cannot share The gladness of the scene; Whose part, in all the pomp that fills The circuit of the summer hills, Is--that his grave is green; And deeply would their hearts rejoice To hear again his living voice.

A SONG OF PITCAIRN'S ISLAND.

Come take our boy, and we will go Before our cabin door; The winds shall bring us, as they blow, The murmurs of the shore; And we will kiss his young blue eyes, And I will sing him, as he lies, Songs that were made of yore: I'll sing, in his delighted ear, The island lays thou lov'st to hear.

And thou, while stammering I repeat, Thy country's tongue shalt teach; 'Tis not so soft, but far more sweet Than my own native speech: For thou no other tongue didst know, When, scarcely twenty moons ago, Upon Tahete's beach, Thou cam'st to woo me to be thine, With many a speaking look and sign.

I knew thy meaning--thou didst praise My eyes, my locks of jet; Ah! well for me they won thy gaze,-- But thine were fairer yet! I'm glad to see my infant wear Thy soft blue eyes and sunny hair, And when my sight is met By his white brow and blooming cheek, I feel a joy I cannot speak.

Come talk of Europe's maids with me, Whose necks and cheeks, they tell, Outshine the beauty of the sea, White foam and crimson shell. I'll shape like theirs my simple dress, And bind like them each jetty tress, A sight to please thee well: And for my dusky brow will braid A bonnet like an English maid.

Come, for the low sunlight calls, We lose the pleasant hours; 'Tis lovelier than these cottage walls,-- That seat among the flowers. And I will learn of thee a prayer, To Him who gave a home so fair, A lot so blest as ours-- The God who made, for thee and me, This sweet lone isle amid the sea.

THE SKIES.

Ay! gloriously thou standest there, Beautiful, boundles firmament! That, swelling wide o'er earth and air, And round the horizon bent, With thy bright vault, and sapphire wall, Dost overhang and circle all.

Far, far below thee, tall old trees Arise, and piles built up of old, And hills, whose ancient summits freeze In the fierce light and cold. The eagle soars his utmost height, Yet far thou stretchest o'er his flight.

Thou hast thy frowns--with thee on high The storm has made his airy seat, Beyond that soft blue curtain lie His stores of hail and sleet. Thence the consuming lightnings break, There the strong hurricanes awake.

Yet art thou prodigal of smiles-- Smiles, sweeter than thy frowns are stern: Earth sends, from all her thousand isles, A shout at thy return. The glory that comes down from thee, Bathes, in deep joy, the land and sea.

The sun, the gorgeous sun is thine, The pomp that brings and shuts the day, The clouds that round him change and shine, The airs that fan his way. Thence look the thoughtful stars, and there The meek moon walks the silent air.

The sunny Italy may boast The beauteous tints that flush her skies, And lovely, round the Grecian coast, May thy blue pillars rise. I only know how fair they stand Around my own beloved land.

And they are fair--a charm is theirs, That earth, the proud green earth, has not-- With all the forms, and hues, and airs, That haunt her sweetest spot. We gaze upon thy calm pure sphere, And read of Heaven's eternal year.

Oh, when, amid the throng of men, The heart grows sick of hollow mirth, How willingly we turn us then Away from this cold earth, And look into thy azure breast, For seats of innocence and rest!

"I CANNOT FORGET WITH WHAT FERVID DEVOTION."

I cannot forget with what fervid devotion I worshipped the vision of verse and of fame. Each gaze at the glories of earth, sky, and ocean, To my kindled emotions, was wind over flame.

And deep were my musings in life's early blossom, Mid the twilight of mountain groves wandering long; How thrilled my young veins, and how throbbed my full bosom, When o'er me descended the spirit of song.

'Mong the deep-cloven fells that for ages had listened To the rush of the pebble-paved river between, Where the kingfisher screamed and gray precipice glistened, All breathless with awe have I gazed on the scene;

Till I felt the dark power o'er my reveries stealing, From his throne in the depth of that stern solitude, And he breathed through my lips, in that tempest of feeling, Strains lofty or tender, though artless and rude.

Bright visions! I mixed with the world, and ye faded; No longer your pure rural worshipper now; In the haunts your continual presence pervaded, Ye shrink from the signet of care on my brow.

In the old mossy groves on the breast of the mountain, In deep lonely glens where the waters complain, By the shade of the rock, by the gush of the fountain, I seek your loved footsteps, but seek them in vain.

Oh, leave not, forlorn and for ever forsaken, Your pupil and victim to life and its tears! But sometimes return, and in mercy awaken The glories ye showed to his earlier years.

TO A MUSQUITO.

Fair insect! that, with threadlike legs spread out, And blood-extracting bill and filmy wing, Does murmur, as thou slowly sail'st about, In pitiless ears full many a plaintive thing, And tell how little our large veins should bleed, Would we but yield them to thy bitter need.

Unwillingly, I own, and, what is worse, Full angrily men hearken to thy plaint; Thou gettest many a brush, and many a curse, For saying thou art gaunt, and starved, and faint: Even the old beggar, while he asks for food, Would kill thee, hapless stranger, if he could.

I call thee stranger, for the town, I ween, Has not the honour of so proud a birth,-- Thou com'st from Jersey meadows, fresh and green, The offspring of the gods, though born on earth; For Titan was thy sire, and fair was she, The ocean nymph that nursed thy infancy.

Beneath the rushes was thy cradle swung, And when, at length, thy gauzy wings grew strong, Abroad to gentle airs their folds were flung, Rose in the sky and bore thee soft along; The south wind breathed to waft thee on thy way, And danced and shone beneath the billowy bay.

Calm rose afar the city spires, and thence Came the deep murmur of its throng of men, And as its grateful odours met thy sense, They seemed the perfumes of thy native fen. Fair lay its crowded streets, and at the sight Thy tiny song grew shriller with delight.

At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway-- Ah, there were fairy steps, and white necks kissed By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray Shone through the snowy veils like stars through mist; And fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin, Bloomed the bright blood through the transparent skin.

Sure these were sights to touch an anchorite! What! do I hear thy slender voice complain? Thou wailest, when I talk of beauty's light, As if it brought the memory of pain: Thou art a wayward being--well--come near, And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear.

What sayst thou--slanderer!--rouge makes thee sick? And China bloom at best is sorry food? And Rowland's Kalydor, if laid on thick, Poisons the thirsty wretch that bores for blood? Go! 'twas a just reward that met thy crime-- But shun the sacrilege another time.

That bloom was made to look at, not to touch; To worship, not approach, that radiant white; And well might sudden vengeance light on such As dared, like thee, most impiously to bite. Thou shouldst have gazed at distance and admired, Murmured thy adoration and retired.

Thou'rt welcome to the town--but why come here To bleed a brother poet, gaunt like thee? Alas! the little blood I have is dear, And thin will be the banquet drawn from me. Look round--the pale-eyed sisters in my cell, Thy old acquaintance, Song and Famine, dwell.

Try some plump alderman, and suck the blood Enriched by generous wine and costly meat; On well-filled skins, sleek as thy native mud, Fix thy light pump and press thy freckled feet: Go to the men for whom, in ocean's hall, The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls.

There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows To fill the swelling veins for thee, and now The ruddy cheek and now the ruddier nose Shall tempt thee, as thou flittest round the brow; And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings, No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.

LINES ON REVISITING THE COUNTRY.

I stand upon my native hills again, Broad, round, and green, that in the summer sky With garniture of waving grass and grain, Orchards, and beechen forests, basking lie, While deep the sunless glens are scooped between, Where brawl o'er shallow beds the streams unseen.

A lisping voice and glancing eyes are near, And ever restless feet of one, who, now, Gathers the blossoms of her fourth bright year; There plays a gladness o'er her fair young brow, As breaks the varied scene upon her sight, Upheaved and spread in verdure and in light.

For I have taught her, with delighted eye, To gaze upon the mountains,--to behold, With deep affection, the pure ample sky, And clouds along its blue abysses rolled,-- To love the song of waters, and to hear The melody of winds with charmed ear.

Here, I have 'scaped the city's stifling heat, Its horrid sounds, and its polluted air; And, where the season's milder fervours beat, And gales, that sweep the forest borders, bear The song of bird, and sound of running stream, Am come awhile to wander and to dream.

Ay, flame thy fiercest, sun! thou canst not wake, In this pure air, the plague that walks unseen. The maize leaf and the maple bough but take, From thy strong heats, a deeper, glossier green. The mountain wind, that faints not in thy ray, Sweeps the blue steams of pestilence away.

The mountain wind! most spiritual thing of all The wide earth knows; when, in the sultry time, He stoops him from his vast cerulean hall, He seems the breath of a celestial clime! As if from heaven's wide-open gates did flow Health and refreshment on the world below.

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS.

The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year, Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sear. Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead; They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread. The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay, And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day.

Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang and stood In brighter light, and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood? Alas! they all are in their graves, the gentle race, of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours. The rain is falling where they lie, but the cold November rain Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.