Freedom

We all have hearts that shake alike
Beneath the arias of Fate's hand;
Although the cynics sneering stand,
These too the deathless powers strike.

A trembling lover's infinite trust,
To the last drop of doating blood,
Feels not alone the ocean flood
Of desperate grief, when dreams are dust.

The scornfullest souls, with mourning eyes,
Pant o'er again their ghostly ways; -
Dread night-paths, where were gleaming days
When life was lovelier than the skies!

I knew an old wife lean and poor,
Her rags scarce held together;
There strode a stranger to the door,
And it was windy weather.

He held a goose upon his arm,
He utter’d rhyme and reason:
‘Here, take the goose, and keep you warm
It is a stormy season.’

She caught the white goose by the leg,
A goose–’twas no great matter.
The goose let fall a golden egg
With cackle and with clatter.

She dropt the goose, and caught the pelf,
And ran to tell her neighbors,
And bless’d herself, and cursed herself,
And rested from her labors;

And feeding high, and living soft,
Grew plump and able-bodied,
Until the grave churchwarden doff’d,
The parson smirk’d and nodded.

So sitting, served by man and maid,
She felt her heart gro...

Thou hast woven the spell that hath bound me,
    Through all the sad changes of years;
And the smiles that I wore when I found thee,
    Have faded and melted in tears!
Like the poor, wounded fawn from the mountain,
    That seeks out the clear silver tide,
I have lingered in vain at the fountain
    Of hope--with a shaft in my side!

Thou hast taught me that Love's rosy fetters
    A pang from the thorns may impart;
That the coinage of vows and of letters
    Comes not from the mint of the heart.
Like the lone bird that flutters her pinion,
    And warbles in bondage her strain,
I have struggled to fly thy domain,
    But find that the struggle is vain!

As toilsome I wander'd Virginia's woods,
To the music of rustling leaves, kick'd by my feet, (for 'twas autumn,)
I mark'd at the foot of a tree the grave of a soldier,
Mortally wounded he, and buried on the retreat, (easily all could I understand;)
The halt of a mid-day hour, when up! no time to lose--yet this sign left,
On a tablet scrawl'd and nail'd on the tree by the grave,
Bold, cautious, true, and my loving comrade.

Long, long I muse, then on my way go wandering;
Many a changeful season to follow, and many a scene of life;
Yet at times through changeful season and scene, abrupt, alone, or in the crowded street,
Comes before me the unknown soldier's grave--comes the inscription rude in Virginia's woods,
Bold, cautious, true, and my loving comrade.

O love, what hours were thine and mine,
In lands of palm and southern pine;
In lands of palm, of orange-blossom,
Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine.

What Roman strength Turbia show’d
In ruin, by the mountain road;
How like a gem, beneath, the city
Of little Monaco, basking, glow’d.

How richly down the rocky dell
The torrent vineyard streaming fell
To meet the sun and sunny waters,
That only heaved with a summer swell.

What slender campanili grew
By bays, the peacock’s neck in hue;
Where, here and there, on sandy beaches
A milky-bell’d amaryllis blew.

How young Columbus seem’d to rove,
Yet present in his natal grove,
Now watching high on mountain cornice,
And steering, now, from a purple cove,

Now pacing mute by...

The minstrel of the classic lay
Of love and wine who sings
Still found the fingers run astray
That touched the rebel strings.

Of Cadmus he would fain have sung,
Of Atreus and his line;
But all the jocund echoes rung
With songs of love and wine.

Ah, brothers! I would fain have caught
Some fresher fancy's gleam;
My truant accents find, unsought,
The old familiar theme.

Love, Love! but not the sportive child
With shaft and twanging bow,
Whose random arrows drove us wild
Some threescore years ago;

Not Eros, with his joyous laugh,
The urchin blind and bare,
But Love, with spectacles and staff,
And scanty, silvered hair.

Our heads with frosted locks are white,
Our roofs are thatched with snow,
But red, in c...

Posthumous Fragments Of Margaret Mcholson.

Being Poems found amongst the Papers of that noted Female who attempted the life of the King in 1786. Edited by John Fitzvictor.

[The "Posthumous Fragments", published at Oxford by Shelley, appeared in November, 1810.]



Despair.

And canst thou mock mine agony, thus calm
In cloudless radiance, Queen of silver night?
Can you, ye flow'rets, spread your perfumed balm
Mid pearly gems of dew that shine so bright?
And you wild winds, thus can you sleep so still
Whilst throbs the tempest of my breast so high?
Can the fierce night-fiends rest on yonder hill,
And, in the eternal mansions of the sky,
Can the directors of the storm in powerless silence lie?

Hark! I hear music on the zephyr's wing,
L...

Wearily stretches the sand to the surge, and the surge to the cloudland;
Wearily onward I ride, watching the water alone.
Not as of old, like Homeric Achilles, ??de? ya???,
Joyous knight-errant of God, thirsting for labour and strife;
No more on magical steed borne free through the regions of ether,
But, like the hack which I ride, selling my sinew for gold.
Fruit-bearing autumn is gone; let the sad quiet winter hang o'er me -
What were the spring to a soul laden with sorrow and shame?
Blossoms would fret me with beauty; my heart has no time to bepraise them;
Gray rock, bough, surge, cloud, waken no yearning within.
Sing not, thou sky-lark above! even angels pass hushed by the weeper.
Scream on, ye sea-fowl! my heart echoes your desolate cry.
Sweep the dry sand on, thou wild wind...

The Fall of Venice not to be lamented--Former Glory.--Expedition against Constantinople.--Giustinianis.--Republic.--Characteristics of the old Government.--Golden Book.--Brazen Mouths.--Spies.--Dungeons.--Present Desolation.


Mourn not for VENICE--let her rest
In ruin, 'mong those States unblest,
Beneath whose gilded hoofs of pride,
Where'er they trampled, Freedom died.
No--let us keep our tears for them,
    Where'er they pine, whose fall hath been
Not from a blood-stained diadem,
    Like that which deckt this ocean-queen,
But from high daring in the cause
    Of human Rights--the only good
And blessed strife, in which man draws
    His mighty sword on land or flood.

Mourn not for VENICE; tho' her fall
    Be awful, as if Ocean's wave
Swep...

I watched them from the window, thy children at their play,
And I thought of all my own dear friends, who were far, oh, far away,
And childish loves, and childish cares, and a child’s own buoyant gladness
Came gushing back again to me with a soft and solemn sadness;
And feelings frozen up full long, and thoughts of long ago,
Seemed to be thawing at my heart with a warm and sudden flow.

I looked upon thy children, and I thought of all and each,
Of my brother and my sister, and our rambles on the beach,
Of my mother’s gentle voice, and my mother’s beckoning hand,
And all the tales she used to tell of the far, far English land;
And the happy, happy evening hours, when I sat on my father’s knee,
Oh! many a wave is rolling now betwixt that seat and me!

And many a day has p...

    Would that in body and spirit Shakespeare came
    Visible emperor of the deeds of Time,
    With Justice still the genius of his rhyme,
    Giving each man his due, each passion grace,
    Impartial as the rain from Heaven's face
    Or sunshine from the heaven-enthroned sun.
    Sweet Swan of Avon, come to us again.
    Teach us to write, and writing, to be men.

The red blood clings in her cheeks and stings
Through their tan with a fever that lightens,
And the clearness of heaven-born mountain springs
In her dark eyes dusks and brightens.
And her limbs are the limbs of an Atalanta who swings
With the youths in the sinewy games,
When the hot air sings thro' the hair it flings,
And the circus roars hoarse with their names,
As they fly to the goal that flames.

A voice as deep as wan waters that sweep
Thro' the musical reeds of a river;
A song of red reapers that bind and reap,
With the ring of curved scythes that quiver.
The note-like lisp of the pippins that leap,
Ripe-mellowed to gold, to the ground;
The murmurous sleep that the cool leaves keep
On close lips that trickle with sound.

And sweet is the b...

Ah, God! were I away, away,
By woodland-belted hills!
There might be more in Thy bright day
Than my poor spirit thrills.

The elder coppice, banks of blooms,
The spice-wood brush, the field
Of tumbled clover, and perfumes
Hot, weedy pastures yield.

The old rail-fence whose angles hold
Bright briar and sassafras,
Sweet priceless wild flowers blue and gold
Starred through the moss and grass.

The ragged path that winds unto
Lone cow-behaunted nooks,
Through brambles to the shade and dew
Of rocks and woody brooks.

To see the minnows turn and gleam
White sparkling bellies, all
Shoot in gray schools adown the stream
Let but a dead leaf fall.

The buoyant pleasure and delight
Of floating feathered seeds.
Capri...

I asked the old Negro, "What is that bird that sings so well?" He answered:    "That is the Rachel-Jane."    "Hasn't it another name, lark, or thrush, or the like?"    "No.    Jus' Rachel-Jane."


            I.    In which a Racing Auto comes from the East

                    # To be sung delicately, to an improvised tune. #
    This is the order of the music of the morning: -
    First, from the far East comes but a crooning.
    The crooning turns to a sunrise singing.
    Hark to the calm-horn, balm-horn, psalm-horn.
    Hark to the faint-horn, quaint-horn, saint-horn....

                    # To be sung or read with great speed. #
    Hark to the pace-horn, chase-horn, race-horn.
    And the holy veil...

"Give us Rain, Rain," said the bean and the pea,
    "Not so much Sun,
    Not so much Sun."
But the Sun smiles bravely and encouragingly,
And no rain falls and no waters run.

"Give us Peace, Peace," said the peoples oppressed,
    "Not so many Flags,
    Not so many Flags."
But the Flags fly and the Drums beat, denying rest,
And the children starve, they shiver in rags.

    The dim verbena drugs the dusk
        With heavy lemon odors rare;
    Wan heliotropes Arabian musk
        Exhale into the dreamy air;
    A sad wind with long wooing husk
        Swoons in the roses there.

    The jasmine at thy casement flings
        Star-censers oozing rich perfumes;
    The clematis, long petaled, swings
        Deep clusters of dark purple blooms;
    With flowers like moons or sylphide wings
        Magnolias light the glooms.

    Awake, awake from sleep!
        Thy balmy hair,
    Unbounden deep on deep,
        Than blossoms fair,
    Who sweetest fragrance weep,
        Will fill the night with prayer.
    Awake, awake from sleep!

    And dreaming here it seems to me
        Some dryad's b...

The pledge of Friendship! it is still divine,
Though watery floods have quenched its burning wine;
Whatever vase the sacred drops may hold,
The gourd, the shell, the cup of beaten gold,
Around its brim the hand of Nature throws
A garland sweeter than the banquet's rose.
Bright are the blushes of the vine-wreathed bowl,
Warm with the sunshine of Anacreon's soul,
But dearer memories gild the tasteless wave
That fainting Sidney perished as he gave.
'T is the heart's current lends the cup its glow,
Whate'er the fountain whence the draught may flow, -
The diamond dew-drops sparkling through the sand,
Scooped by the Arab in his sunburnt hand,
Or the dark streamlet oozing from the snow,
Where creep and crouch the shuddering Esquimaux;
Ay, in the stream that, ere agai...

Of home, name and wealth and ambition bereft,
We are children of fortune and luck:
They deny there’s a shred of our characters left,
But they cannot deny us the pluck!
We are vagabond scamps, we are kings over all,
There is little on earth we desire,
We are devils who stand with our backs to the wall,
And who call on the cowards to fire!

There are some of us here who were noble and good,
And who learnt in ingratitude’s schools,
They were born of the selfish and misunderstood,
They were soft, they were ‘smoodgers’ or fools.
With their hands in their pockets to help every friend
In a fix, and they never asked how:
Beware of them you who have money to lend,
For it’s little you’d get from them now.

There are some of us here who were lovers of old,