Death

Smile of the Moon! for I so name
That silent greeting from above;
A gentle flash of light that came
From her whom drooping captives love;
Or art thou of still higher birth?
Thou that didst part the clouds of earth,
My torpor to reprove!

Bright boon of pitying Heaven! alas,
I may not trust thy placid cheer!
Pondering that Time tonight will pass
The threshold of another year;
For years to me are sad and dull;
My very moments are too full
Of hopelessness and fear.

And yet, the soul-awakening gleam,
That struck perchance the farthest cone
Of Scotland's rocky wilds, did seem
To visit me, and me alone;
Me, unapproached by any friend,
Save those who to my sorrow lend
Tears due unto their own.

To night the church-tower bells ...

Midnight, and in the darkness not a sound,
So, with hushed breathing, sleeps the autumn night;
Only the white immortal stars shall know,
Here in the house with the low-lintelled door,
How, for the last time, I have lit the lamp.
I think you are not wholly careless now,
Walls that have sheltered me so many an hour,
Bed that has brought me ecstasy and sleep,
Floors that have borne me when a gale of joy
Lifted my soul and made me half a god.
Farewell! Across the threshold many feet
Shall pass, but never Sappho's feet again.
Girls shall come in whom love has made aware
Of all their swaying beauty they shall sing,
But never Sappho's voice, like golden fire,
Shall seek for heaven thru your echoing rafters.
There shall be swallows bringing back the spring
Over t...

What does one gain by living? What by dying
Is lost worth having? What the daily things
Lived through together make them worth the while
For their sakes or for life's? Where's the denying
Of souls through separation? There's your smile!
And your hands' touch! And the long day that brings
Half uttered nothings of delight! But then
Now that I see you not, and shall again
Touch you no more - memory can possess
Your soul's essential self, and none the less
You live with me. I therefore write to you
This letter just as if you were away
Upon a journey, or a holiday;
And so I'll put down everything that's new
In this secluded village, since you left. ...
Now let me think! Well, then, as I remember,
After ten days the lilacs burst in bloom.
We had spring all at o...

    "Stay, mother, stay, for the storm is abroad,
And the tempest is very wild;
It's a fearful night with no ray of light,
Oh stay with your little child!"

    "Hush darling!" the mother, with white lips said -
"Lie still till I come again,
God's angels blest will watch o'er thy rest
While I am abroad in the rain!
    Thy father, child? - oh, I quake with fear
When I think where he may be,
And I dare not stay till the dawn of day -
I must hasten forth to see!"

    Then the young child buried her tangled curls
In the ragged counterpane,
While the half-clad mother went forth alone
In the blinding wind and rain.

    Down many a narrow, slippery lane,
Down many a long, dark street,
Went that shivering form thro' the pelting storm
O...

When first the fane, that, white, on Kingswood-Pen,
Arrests, far off, the pausing stranger's ken,
Echoed the hymn of praise, and on that day,
Which seemed to shine with more auspicious ray,
When thousands listened to the prelate[214] there,
Who called on God, with consecrating prayer; -
I saw a village-maid, almost a child,        7
Even as a light-haired cherub, undefiled
From earth's rank fume, with innocent look, her eye
Meekly uplifted to the throne on high,
Join in the full choir's solemn harmony.
Oh, then, how many boding thoughts arose,
Lest, long ere varied life's uncertain close,
Those looks of modesty, that open truth
Lighting the forehead of ingenuous youth -
Lest these, as slowly steal maturing years,
Should fade, and grief succeed, and dimming tea...

Let a valiant Faith cross swords with Death,
And Death is certain to fall;
For the dead arise with joy in their eyes -
They were not dead at all.
If this were only a world of chance,
Then faith, with its strong white spark
Could burn through the sod and fashion a God,
And set Him to shine in the dark.

So in troublesome days, and in shadowy ways,
In the dire and difficult time,
We must cling, we must cling to our Faith, and bring
Our courage to heights sublime.
It is not a matter of hugging a creed
That will lift us up to the light,
But in keeping our trust that Love is just,
And that whatever is, is right.

When the hopes of this world into chaos are hurled,
And the devil seems running the earth,
When the bad folks stay and the good pass a...

        Reading over your letters I find you wrote me
    "My dear boy," or at times "dear boy," and the envelope
    Said "master" - all as I had been your very son,
    And not the orphan whom you adopted.
    Well, you were father to me! And I can recall
    The things you did for me or gave me:
    One time we rode in a box car to Springfield
    To see the greatest show on earth;
    And one time you gave me redtop boots,
    And one time a watch, and one time a gun.
    Well, I grew to gawkiness with a voice
    Like a rooster trying to crow in August
    Hatched in April, we'll say.
    And you went about wrapped up in silence
    With eyes aflame, and I heard little rumors
    Of what they were doing to you, and how
    They wronged you - and we were p...

Some die too late and some too soon,
At early morning, heat of noon,
Or the chill evening twilight. Thou,
Whom the rich heavens did so endow
With eyes of power and Jove's own brow,
With all the massive strength that fills
Thy home-horizon's granite hills,
With rarest gifts of heart and head
From manliest stock inherited,
New England's stateliest type of man,
In port and speech Olympian;

Whom no one met, at first, but took
A second awed and wondering look
(As turned, perchance, the eyes of Greece
On Phidias' unveiled masterpiece);
Whose words in simplest homespun clad,
The Saxon strength of Caedmon's had,
With power reserved at need to reach
The Roman forum's loftiest speech,
Sweet with persuasion, eloquent
In passion, cool in argument...

I said, 'I will place my heart, my heart all broken,
    Beside the world's torn heart, that it may know
The comradeship of sorrow that is not spoken,
    But is carried on wings of all the winds that blow.
I will go homeless into homes of grieving,
    And find my own grief easier to be borne.'
So over menacing seas I went, believing
    Where all was mourning, I would cease to mourn.

And now I am here, close to the great world-sorrow,
    Here where each heart some mighty grief has known;
But from each suffering soul I seem to borrow
    A poignant pain that but augments my own.
The earth is like one vast tempestuous ocean,
    Where struggling beings fight for light and breath:
I feel their anguish, feel each keen emotion -
    Yet through it all, I KNOW T...

Five rotten gables look upon
Wan rotting roses and rank weeds,
Old iron gates on posts of stone,
Dim dingles where the vermin breeds.
Five rotten gables black appear
Above bleak yews and cedars sad,
And thence they see the sleepy mere
In lazy lilies clad.

At morn the slender dragon-fly,
A burnished ray of light, darts past;
The knightly bee comes charging by
Winding a surly blast.
At noon amid the fervid leaves
The quarreling insects gossip hot,
And thro' the grass the spider weaves
A weft with silver shot.

At eve the hermit cricket rears
His vesper song in shrillful shrieks;
The bat a blund'ring voyage steers
Beneath the sunset's streaks.
The slimy worm gnaws at the bud,
The Katydid talks dreamily;
The sullen owl in m...

Death stands above me, whispering low
I know not what into my ear:
Of his strange language all I know
Is, there is not a word of fear.

Died at Hartford, October 23d, 1861, aged 20.


                    How beautiful in death
The young and lovely sleeper lies--
Sweet calmness on the close-sealed eyes,
Flowers o'er the snowy neck and brow
Where lustrous curls profusely flow;
If 'twere not for the icy chill
That from her marble hand doth thrill,
And for her lip that gives no sound,
And for the weeping all around,
                    How beautiful were death.

                    How beautiful in life!
Her pure affections heavenward moving,
Her guileless heart so full of loving,
Her joyous smile, her form of grace,
Her clear mind lighting up the face,
And making home a blessed place,
Still breathing thro' the parents' heart
A gladness words could ne'er impart,
A fai...

FROM THE GREEK OF BION.


I mourn Adonis dead - loveliest Adonis -
Dead, dead Adonis - and the Loves lament.
Sleep no more, Venus, wrapped in purple woof -
Wake violet-stoled queen, and weave the crown
Of Death, - 'tis Misery calls, - for he is dead.

The lovely one lies wounded in the mountains,
His white thigh struck with the white tooth; he scarce
Yet breathes; and Venus hangs in agony there.
The dark blood wanders o'er his snowy limbs,
His eyes beneath their lids are lustreless,
The rose has fled from his wan lips, and there
That kiss is dead, which Venus gathers yet.

A deep, deep wound Adonis...
A deeper Venus bears upon her heart.
See, his beloved dogs are gathering round -
The Oread nymphs are weeping - Aphrodite
With hair unbo...

I have dreamed sweet dreams of a summer night,
When the moon was walking in cloudless light,
And my soul to the regions of Fancy sprung,
While the spirits of air their soft anthems sung,
Strains wafted down from those heavenly spheres
Which may not be warbled in waking ears;
More sweet than the voice of waters flowing,
Than the breeze over beds of violets blowing,
When it stirs the pines, and sultry day
Fans himself cool with their tremulous play.
On the sleeper's ear those rich notes stealing,
Speak of purer and holier feeling
Than man in his pilgrimage here below,
In the bondage of sin, can ever know.

    I heard in my slumbers the ceaseless roar
Of the sparkling waves, as they met the shore,
Till lulled by the surge of the moon-lit deep,
By the h...

A blush as of roses
Where rose never grew!
Great drops on the bunch-grass,
But not of the dew!
A taint in the sweet air
For wild bees to shun!
A stain that shall never
Bleach out in the sun!
Back, steed of the prairies!
Sweet song-bird, fly back!
Wheel hither, bald vulture!
Gray wolf, call thy pack!
The foul human vultures
Have feasted and fled;
The wolves of the Border
Have crept from the dead.
From the hearths of their cabins,
The fields of their corn,
Unwarned and unweaponed,
The victims were torn,
By the whirlwind of murder
Swooped up and swept on
To the low, reedy fen-lands,
The Marsh of the Swan.
With a vain plea for mercy
No stout knee was crooked;
In the mouths of the rifles
Right manly they looked...

When I meet the morning beam,
Or lay me down at night to dream,
I hear my bones within me say,
"Another night, another day."

"When shall this slough of sense be cast,
This dust of thoughts be laid at last,
The man of flesh and soul be slain
And the man of bone remain?"

"This tongue that talks, these lungs that shout,
These thews that hustle us about,
This brain that fills the skull with schemes,
And its humming hive of dreams,-"

"These to-day are proud in power
And lord it in their little hour:
The immortal bones obey control
Of dying flesh and dying soul."

" 'Tis long till eve and morn are gone:
Slow the endless night comes on,
And late to fulness grows the birth
That shall last as long as earth."

"Wanderers e...

Three old hermits took the air
By a cold and desolate sea,
First was muttering a prayer,
Second rummaged for a flea;
On a windy stone, the third,
Giddy with his hundredth year,
Sang unnoticed like a bird.
‘Though the Door of Death is near
And what waits behind the door,
Three times in a single day
I, though upright on the shore,
Fall asleep when I should pray.’
So the first but now the second,
‘We’re but given what we have earned
When all thoughts and deeds are reckoned
So it’s plain to be discerned
That the shades of holy men,
Who have failed being weak of will,
Pass the Door of Birth again,
And are plagued by crowds, until
They’ve the passion to escape.’
Moaned the other, ‘They are thrown
Into some most fearful shape.’
But ...

    Time, when thou shalt bring again
    Pallas from the Trojan plain,
    Portia from the Roman's hall,
    Brynhild from the fiery wall,
    Eleanor, whose fearless breath
    Drew the venom'd fangs of Death,
    And Philippa doubly brave
    Or to conquer or to save--

    When thou shalt on one bestow
    All their grace and all their glow,
    All their strength and all their state,
    All their passion pure and great,
    Some far age may honour then
    Such another queen of men.