Family

Cool shades and dews are round my way,
And silence of the early day;
Mid the dark rocks that watch his bed,
Glitters the mighty Hudson spread,
Unrippled, save by drops that fall
From shrubs that fringe his mountain wall;
And o'er the clear still water swells
The music of the Sabbath bells.

All, save this little nook of land
Circled with trees, on which I stand;
All, save that line of hills which lie
Suspended in the mimic sky,
Seems a blue void, above, below,
Through which the white clouds come and go,
And from the green world's farthest steep
I gaze into the airy deep.

Loveliest of lovely things are they,
On earth, that soonest pass away.
The rose that lives its little hour
Is prized beyond the sculptured flower.
Even love, lon...

The sea of the years that endure not
Whose tide shall endure till we die
And know what the seasons assure not,
If death be or life be a lie,
Sways hither the spirit and thither,
A waif in the swing of the sea
Whose wrecks are of memories that wither
As leaves of a tree.
We hear not and hail not with greeting
The sound of the wings of the years,
The storm of the sound of them beating,
That none till it pass from him hears:
But tempest nor calm can imperil
The treasures that fade not or fly;
Change bids them not change and be sterile,
Death bids them not die.
Hearts plighted in youth to the royal
High service of hope and of song,
Sealed fast for endurance as loyal,
And proved of the years as they throng,
Conceive not, believe not, and fear no...

The Fisherman's swapping a yarn for a yarn
Under the hand of the village barber,
And here in the angle of house and barn
His deep-sea dory has found a harbor.

At anchor she rides the sunny sod
As full to the gunnel with flowers a-growing
As ever she turned her home with cod
From George’s Bank when winds were blowing.

And I know from that Elysian freight
She will brave but once more the Atlantic weather,
When dory and fisherman sail by fate
To seek for the Happy Isles together.

Go, little flutt'rer! seek thy feather'd loves,
And leave a wretched mourner to his woe;
Seek out the bow'rs of bliss, seek happier groves,
Nor here unheeded let thy music flow.

Yet think me not ungrateful for thy song,
If meant to cheer me in my lone retreat;
Ah! not to thee, my little friend! belong
The pow'rs to soothe the pangs of adverse fate.

Fly, then! the window of the wretched, fly!
And be thy harmless life for ever blest;
I only can reward thee with a sigh,
And wish that joys may crown thy peaceful nest.

Oh thou, that prattling on thy pebbled way
Through my paternal vale dost stray,
Working thy shallow passage to the sea!
Oh, stream, thou speedest on
The same as many seasons gone;
But not, alas, to me
Remain the feelings that beguiled
My early road, when, careless and content,
(Losing the hours in pastimes innocent)
Upon thy banks I strayed a playful child;
Whether the pebbles that thy margin strew,
Collecting, heedlessly I threw;
Or loved in thy translucent wave
My tender shrinking feet to lave;
Or else ensnared your little fry,
And thought how wondrous skilled was I!
So passed my boyish days, unknown to pain,
Days that will ne'er return again.
It seems but yesterday
I was a child, to-morrow to be gray!
So years succeeding years steal sile...

Let us go hence, my songs; she will not hear.
Let us go hence together without fear;
Keep silence now, for singing-time is over,
And over all old things and all things dear.
She loves not you nor me as all we love her.
Yea, though we sang as angels in her ear,
She would not hear.

Let us rise up and part; she will not know.
Let us go seaward as the great winds go,
Full of blown sand and foam; what help is here?
There is no help, for all these things are so,
And all the world is bitter as a tear.
And how these things are, though ye strove to show,
She would not know.

Let us go home and hence; she will not weep.
We gave love many dreams and days to keep,
Flowers without scent, and fruits that would not grow,
Saying ‘If thou wilt, thrust in thy si...

Farther and farther away, alas! at each moment the vessel

Hastens, as onward it glides, cleaving the foam-cover'd flood!
Long is the track plough'd up by the keel where dolphins are sporting,

Following fast in its rear, while it seems flying pursuit.
All forebodes a prosperous voyage; the sailor with calmness

Leans 'gainst the sail, which alone all that is needed performs.
Forward presses the heart of each seamen, like colours and streamers;

Backward one only is seen, mournfully fix'd near the mast,
While on the blue tinged mountains, which fast are receding, he gazeth,

And as they sink in the sea, joy from his bosom departs.
Vanish'd from thee, too, oh Dora, is now the vessel that robs thee

Of thine Alexis, thy friend, ah, thy betrothed as well!

    The coffin [1] as I past across the lane
    Came sudden on my view. It was not here,
    A sight of every day, as in the streets
    Of the great city, and we paus'd and ask'd
    Who to the grave was going. It was one,
    A village girl, they told us, who had borne
    An eighteen months strange illness, and had pined
    With such slow wasting that the hour of death
    Came welcome to her. We pursued our way
    To the house of mirth, and with that idle talk
    That passes o'er the mind and is forgot,
    We wore away the time. But it was eve
    When homewardly I went, and in the air
    Was that cool freshness, that discolouring shade
    That makes the eye turn inward. Then I heard
    Over the vale the heavy toll of death
    Sound slow; it made ...

Pale is Amelia's face,
And red Lavinia's nose is;
The sisters ever jar:
'Tis like the civil war
Between the rival roses.

    *        *        *        *        *

On that dark theme, man's genealogy,
How strangely people's notions disagree!
Sir Snub-nose, growling, swears that he can trace
Strong kindred likeness to the monkey-race:
My Lady Graceful smiles, well-pleased, to find
Far more resemblance to the Angelic-kind:
Sure the reflection from their looking-glasses
Into their minds, to prompt opinion passes.
Would-be philosophers have tried to scan
The pedigree of that odd creature, man.
'We are of monkey-race!' Sir Snub-nose cries.
Your strange assertion strikes me with surprise;
(I, for my part, the compliment decline)
But do you,...

Dedication
These to His Memory--since he held them dear,
Perchance as finding there unconsciously
Some image of himself--I dedicate,
I dedicate, I consecrate with tears--
These Idylls.

And indeed He seems to me
Scarce other than my king's ideal knight,
`Who reverenced his conscience as his king;
Whose glory was, redressing human wrong;
Who spake no slander, no, nor listened to it;
Who loved one only and who clave to her--'
Her--over all whose realms to their last isle,
Commingled with the gloom of imminent war,
The shadow of His loss drew like eclipse,
Darkening the world. We have lost him: he is gone:
We know him now: all narrow jealousies
Are silent; and we see him as he moved,
How modest, kindly, all-accomplished, wise,
With what sublim...

I think that though the clouds be dark,
That though the waves dash o'er the bark,
Yet after while the light will come,
And in calm waters safe at home
The bark will anchor.
Weep not, my sad-eyed, gray-robed maid,
Because your fairest blossoms fade,
That sorrow still o'erruns your cup,
And even though you root them up,
The weeds grow ranker.

For after while your tears shall cease,
And sorrow shall give way to peace;
The flowers shall bloom, the weeds shall die,
And in that faith seen, by and by
Thy woes shall perish.
Smile at old Fortune's adverse tide,
Smile when the scoffers sneer and chide.
Oh, not for you the gems that pale,
And not for you the flowers that fail;
Let this thought cherish:

That after while the clouds will part...

When Time who steals our years away
    Shall steal our pleasures too,
The memory of the past will stay
    And half our joys renew,
Then, Julia, when thy beauty's flower
    Shall feel the wintry air,
Remembrance will recall the hour
    When thou alone wert fair.
Then talk no more of future gloom;
    Our joys shall always last;
For Hope shall brighten days to come,
    And Memory gild the past.

Come, Chloe, fill the genial bowl,
    I drink to Love and thee:
Thou never canst decay in soul,
    Thou'lt still be young for me.
And as thy; lips the tear-drop chase,
    Which on my cheek they find,
So hope shall steal away the trace
    That sorrow leaves behind.
Then fill the bowl--away with gloom!
    Our joys shall always last;<...

I dug a grave, one smiling April day,
    A grave whose small proportions testified
To empty arms, and playthings put away,
    To ears which heard, when only fancy cried;
        I wondered, as I shaped that little mound,
        If in my home such grief should e'er be found.

I dug a grave, 'twas in the month of June;
    A grave for one who at his zenith died;
When, on that mound with floral tributes strewn,
    The tear-drops fell of one but late his bride,
        I wondered if upon my silent bier
        Should rest the moist impression of a tear.

I dug a grave by Autumn's sober light,
    A grave of full dimensions; 'twas for one
Whose hair had changed its raven hue to white,
    Whose course had finished with the setting sun;
        I wonde...

Gay visions for thee 'neath hope's pencil have glowed,
Peace dwells in thy bosom, a guileless abode;
Thou hast seen the bright side of existence alone,
And believ'st every spirit as pure as thine own.
May'st thou never awake from these rapturous dreams,
To find that the world is not fair as it seems,
To feel that the few thou hast loved have deceived,
Have forsaken the heart that confided, believed,
And left it as leafless, as bloomless, and waste
As the rose-tree that's stript by the merciless blast.

When the warm sky of childhood was beaming for me,
My days were all joyous, my heart was all glee;
Affection's best ties round my bosom were spun;
No cloud dimmed the lustre of life's morning sun.
If I watched o'er my favorite rose-bud's decay,
And mourned that ...

I saw an aged Beggar in my walk;
And he was seated, by the highway side,
On a low structure of rude masonry
Built at the foot of a huge hill, that they
Who lead their horses down the steep rough road
May thence remount at ease. The aged Man
Had placed his staff across the broad smooth stone
That overlays the pile; and, from a bag
All white with flour, the dole of village dames,
He drew his scraps and fragments, one by one;
And scanned them with a fixed and serious look
Of idle computation. In the sun,
Upon the second step of that small pile,
Surrounded by those wild unpeopled hills,
He sat, and ate his food in solitude:
And ever, scattered from his palsied hand,
That, still attempting to prevent the waste,
Was baffled still, the crumbs in little showers

O Spring, I know thee!    Seek for sweet surprise
    In the young children's eyes.
But I have learnt the years, and know the yet
    Leaf-folded violet.
Mine ear, awake to silence, can foretell
    The cuckoo's fitful bell.
I wander in a grey time that encloses
    June and the wild hedge-roses.
A year's procession of the flowers doth pass
    My feet, along the grass.
And all you sweet birds silent yet, I know
    The notes that stir you so,
Your songs yet half devised in the dim dear
    Beginnings of the year.
In these young days you meditate your part;
    I have it all by heart.

I know the secrets of the seeds of flowers
    Hidden and warm with showers,
And how, in kindling Spring, the cuckoo shall
    Alter his interval.
But n...