Family

Softly the feathery Palm-trees fade in the violet Distance,
Faintly the lingering light touches the edge of the sea,
Sadly the Music of Waves, drifts, faint as an Anthem's insistence,
Heard in the aisles of a dream, over the sandhills, to me.

Now that the Lights are reversed, and the Singing changed into sighing,
Now that the wings of our fierce, fugitive passion are furled,
Take I unto myself, all alone in the light that is dying,
Much of the sorrow that lies hid at the Heart of the World.

Sad am I, sad for your loss: for failing the charm of your presence,
Even the sunshine has paled, leaving the Zenith less blue.
Even the ocean lessens the light of its green opalescence,
Since, to my sorrow I loved, loved and grew weary of, you.

Why was our passion so fleetin...

Down the green slope he bounded. Raven curls
From his white shoulders by the winds were swept,
And the clear color of his sunny cheek
Was bright with motion. Through his open lips
Shone visibly a delicate line of pearl,
Like a white vein within a rosy shell,
And his dark eye's clear brilliance, as it lay
Beneath his lashes, like a drop of dew
Hid in the moss, stole out as covertly
As starlight from the edging of a cloud.
I never saw a boy so beautiful.
His step was like the stooping of a bird,
And his limbs melted into grace like things
Shaped by the wind of summer. He was like
A painter's fine conception - such an one
As he would have of Ganymede, and weep
Upon his pallet that he could not win
The vision to his easel. Who could paint
The young and s...

With one black shadow at its feet,
The house thro' all the level shines,
Close-latticed to the brooding heat,
And silent in its dusty vines:
A faint-blue ridge upon the right,
An empty river-bed before,
And shallows on a distant shore,
In glaring sand and inlets bright.
But "Aye Mary," made she moan,
And "Aye Mary," night and morn,
And "Ah," she sang, "to be all alone,
To live forgotten, and love forlorn."

She, as her carol sadder grew,
From brow and bosom slowly down
Thro' rosy taper fingers drew
Her streaming curls of deepest brown
To left and right, and made appear,
Still-lighted in a secret shrine,
Her melancholy eyes divine,
The home of woe without a tear.
And "Aye Mary," was her moan,
"Madonna, sad is night and morn;"
...

I.

It led adown the sloping hill, and through the valley wound,
And where the blooming clover shed its fragrance all around,
And then between the maple trees, across the little brook,
To where the old fence bars let down, a tortuous course it took;
And often are the times I've heard the merry, ringing laugh,
From rosy-ankled children there, along the meadow path.


II.

Three boys--and a little girl whose hair was chestnut gold--
(She's resting now in dreamless sleep beneath the crumbling mold;)--
But I remember her as when, with innocence and glee,
Her laughing eyes looked into mine--for she was dear to me;
And thus it is I love to let the fancy photograph
The merry group that idled there, along the meadow path.


III.

Adown it...

As I lay awake at night-time
In an ancient country barrack known to ancient cannoneers,
And recalled the hopes that heralded each seeming brave and bright time
Of my primal purple years,

Much it haunted me that, nigh there,
I had borne my bitterest loss - when One who went, came not again;
In a joyless hour of discord, in a joyless-hued July there -
A July just such as then.

And as thus I brooded longer,
With my faint eyes on the feeble square of wan-lit window frame,
A quick conviction sprung within me, grew, and grew yet stronger,
That the month-night was the same,

Too, as that which saw her leave me
On the rugged ridge of Waterstone, the peewits plaining round;
And a lapsing twenty years had ruled that - as it were to grieve me -
I should near ...

All hail, once pleasing, once inspiring shade!
Scene of my youthful loves and happier hours!
Where the kind Muses met me as I stray'd,
And gently press'd my hand, and said "Be ours!
Take all thou e'er shalt have, a constant Muse:
At Court thou may'st be liked, but nothing gain:
Stock thou may'st buy and sell, but always lose,
And love the brightest eyes, but love in vain."

You very fine Miss Molly,
What will the daisies say,
If you carry home so many
Of their little friends to-day?

Perhaps you take a sister,
Perhaps you take a brother,
Or two little daisies who
Were fond of one another.

When insect wings are glistening in the beam
Of the low sun, and mountain-tops are bright,
Oh, let me, by the crystal valley-stream,
Wander amid the mild and mellow light;
And while the wood-thrush pipes his evening lay,
Give me one lonely hour to hymn the setting day.

Oh, sun! that o'er the western mountains now
Goest down in glory! ever beautiful
And blessed is thy radiance, whether thou
Colourest the eastern heaven and night-mist cool,
Till the bright day-star vanish, or on high
Climbest and streamest thy white splendours from mid-sky.

Yet, loveliest are thy setting smiles, and fair,
Fairest of all that earth beholds, the hues
That live among the clouds, and flush the air,
Lingering and deepening at the hour of dews.
Then softest gales are breat...

The wind comes whispering to me of the country green and cool--
Of redwing blackbirds chattering beside a reedy pool;
It brings me soothing fancies of the homestead on the hill,
And I hear the thrush's evening song and the robin's morning trill;
So I fall to thinking tenderly of those I used to know
Where the sassafras and snakeroot and checkerberries grow.

What has become of Ezra Marsh, who lived on Baker's hill?
And what's become of Noble Pratt, whose father kept the mill?
And what's become of Lizzie Crum and Anastasia Snell,
And of Roxie Root, who 'tended school in Boston for a spell?
They were the boys and they the girls who shared my youthful play--
They do not answer to my call! My playmates--where are they?

What has become of Levi and his little brother Joe,

She has been just a year in Heaven.
Unmarked by white moon or gold sun,
By stroke of clock or clang of bell,
Or shadow lengthening on the way,
In the full noon and perfect day,
In Safety's very citadel,
The happy hours have sped, have run;
And, rapt in peace, all pain forgot,
She whom we love, her white soul shriven,
Smiles at the thought and wonders not.

We have been just a year alone,--
A year whose calendar is sighs,
And dull, perpetual wishfulness,
And smiles, each covert for a tear,
And wandering thoughts, half there, half here,
And weariful attempts to guess
The secret of the hiding skies,
The soft, inexorable blue,
With gleaming hints of glory sown,
And Heaven behind, just shining through.

So sweet, so sad, so swift, so s...

        Only a few more years!
        Weary years!
        Only a few more tears!
        Bitter tears!
And then -- and then -- like other men,
I cease to wander, cease to weep,
Dim shadows o'er my way shall creep;
And out of the day and into the night,
Into the dark and out of the bright
I go, and Death shall veil my face,
The feet of the years shall fast efface
My very name, and every trace
I leave on earth; for the stern years tread --
Tread out the names of the gone and dead!
And then, ah! then, like other men,
I close my eyes and go to sleep,
Only a few, one hour, shall weep:
Ah! me, the grave is dark and deep!

        Alas!    Alas!
        How soon we pass!
        And ah! we go
        So far away;
When go we must,<...

Only son of SAMUEL S. FOSS, Esq., died May 23d, 1859, aged three years and three months.


"Read more, Papa," the loving infant cried,--
And meekly bow'd the listening ear, and fix'd
The ardent eye, devouring every word
Of his dear picture book. And then he spread
His arms, and folded thrice the father's neck.
--The mother came from church, and lull'd her boy
To quiet sleep, and laid him in his crib;
And as they watch'd the smile of innocence
That sometimes lightly floated o'er his brow
That Sabbath eve, they to each other said,
"How beautiful."
                    There was another scene,--
The child lay compass'd round with Spring's white flowers,
Yet heav'd no breath to stir their lightest leaf.
And many a one who on that coffin look'd
And ...

I.
Stop, let me have the truth of that!
Is that all true? I say, the day
Ten years ago when both of us
Met on a morning, friends as thus
We meet this evening, friends or what?

II.
Did you because I took your arm
And sillily smiled, “A mass of brass
That sea looks, blazing underneath!”
While up the cliff-road edged with heath,
We took the turns nor came to harm

III.
Did you consider “Now makes twice
“That I have seen her, walked and talked
“With this poor pretty thoughtful thing,
“Whose worth I weigh: she tries to sing;
“Draws, hopes in time the eye grows nice;

IV.
“Reads verse and thinks she understands;
“Loves all, at any rate, that’s great,
“Good, beautiful; but much as we
“Down at the bath-house love the sea,<...

    "So he took up his bow,
    And he feathered his arrow,
    And said, 'I will shoot
    This little cock-sparrow.'"

**    *    *

    "'Tis good to make all duty sweet,
    To be alert and kind;
    'Tis good, like Littie Mabel,
    To have a willing mind."

**    *    *    *

    "Benny had a little dog,
    His fleece was white as snow,
    And everywhere that Benny went,
    The dog was sure to go.


    He went into the School one day,
    which was against the rule;
    It made the children laugh and play
    To see a dog --"

**    *    *    *

I

Fair Lady, whose harmonious name the Rheno
    Through all his grassy vale delights to hear,
    Base were, indeed, the wretch, who could forbear
    To love a spirit elegant as thine,
That manifests a sweetness all divine,
    Nor knows a thousand winning acts to spare,
    And graces, which Love's bow and arrows are,
    Temp'ring thy virtues to a softer shine.
When gracefully thou speak'st, or singest gay
    Such strains as might the senseless forest move,
    Ah then--turn each his eyes and ears away,
Who feels himself unworthy of thy love!
    Grace can alone preserve him, e'er the dart
    Of fond desire yet reach his inmost heart.

II

As on a hill-top rude, when closing day
    Imbrowns the scene, some past'ral maiden fair
...

By scattered rocks and turbid waters shifting,
By furrowed glade and dell,
To feverish men thy calm, sweet face uplifting,
Thou stayest them to tell

The delicate thought that cannot find expression,
For ruder speech too fair,
That, like thy petals, trembles in possession,
And scatters on the air.

The miner pauses in his rugged labor,
And, leaning on his spade,
Laughingly calls unto his comrade-neighbor
To see thy charms displayed.

But in his eyes a mist unwonted rises,
And for a moment clear
Some sweet home face his foolish thought surprises,
And passes in a tear,

Some boyish vision of his Eastern village,
Of uneventful toil,
Where golden harvests followed quiet tillage
Above a peaceful soil.

One moment only; f...

A Long-Vacation Pastoral


VI

Ducite ab urbe domum, mea carmina, ducite Daphnin.

Bright October was come, the misty-bright October,
Bright October was come to burn and glen and cottage;
But the cottage was empty, the matutine deserted.
Who are these that walk by the shore of the salt sea water?
Here in the dusky eve, on the road by the salt sea water?
Who are these? and where? it is no sweet seclusion;
Blank hill-sides slope down to a salt sea loch at their bases,
Scored by runnels, that fringe ere they end with rowan and alder;
Cottages here and there outstanding bare on the mountain,
Peat-roofed, windowless, white; the road underneath by the water.
There on the blank hill-side, looking down through the loch to the ocean,
There with a runne...

Mon. Bad are the times. Sil. And worse than they are we.
Mon. Troth, bad are both; worse fruit and ill the tree:
The feast of shepherds fail. Sil. None crowns the cup
Of wassail now or sets the quintell up;
And he who us'd to lead the country-round,
Youthful Mirtillo, here he comes grief-drown'd.
Ambo. Let's cheer him up. Sil. Behold him weeping-ripe.
Mir. Ah! Amaryllis, farewell mirth and pipe;
Since thou art gone, no more I mean to play
To these smooth lawns my mirthful roundelay.
Dear Amaryllis! Mon. Hark! Sil. Mark! Mir. This earth grew sweet
Where, Amaryllis, thou didst set thy feet.
Ambo. Poor pitied youth! Mir. And here the breath of kine
And sheep grew more sweet by that breath of thi...