Inspirational

The Soul, of late a lovely sleeping child,
Spreads sudden wings and stands in radiant guise,
Eyed like the morn and bent upon the skies;
Her the blue gulf dismays not, nor the wild
Horizons with the wrecks of thunder piled;
Storm has she known, and how its murmur dies
Starlike through stainless heavens she would rise
And be no more with cloudy dreams beguiled.
Was sleep not sweet? sweet till on sleeping ears
Earth's voices broke in discord. Now she hears
Far, far away diviner music move;
Nor shall her wing be sated of its flight,
Nor shall her eyes be weary of the night,
While round her sweep the singing stars of Love.

I.

‘Spring-flowers’! While you still delay to take
Your leave of town,
Our elm-tree’s ruddy-hearted blossom-flake
Is fluttering down.



II.

Be truer to your promise. There! I heard
Our cuckoo call.
Be needle to the magnet of your word,
Nor wait, till all



III.

Our vernal bloom from every vale and plain
And garden pass,
And all the gold from each laburnum chain
Drop to the grass.



IV.

Is memory with your Marian gone to rest,
Dead with the dead?
For ere she left us, when we met, you prest
My hand, and said



V.

‘I come with your spring-flowers.’ You came not, my friend;
My birds would sing,
You heard not. Take then this spring-flower...

In Youth, when through our veins runs fast
The bright red stream of life,
The Soul’s Voice is a trumpet-blast
That calls us to the strife.

The Spirit spurns its prison-bars,
And feels with force endued
To scale the ramparts of the stars
And storm Infinitude.

Youth passes; like a dungeon grows
The Spirit’s house of clay:
The voice that once in music rose
In murmurs dies away.

But in the day when sickness sore
Smites on the body’s walls,
The Soul’s Voice through the breach once more
Like to a trumpet calls.

Well shall it be with him who heeds
The mystic summons then!
His after-life with loving deeds
Shall blossom amongst men.

He shall have gifts, the gift that feels
The germ within the clod,
And hears t...

Lyre! though such power do in thy magic live
As might from India's farthest plain
Recall the not unwilling Maid,
Assist me to detain
The lovely Fugitive:
Check with thy notes the impulse which, betrayed
By her sweet farewell looks, I longed to aid.
Here let me gaze enrapt upon that eye,
The impregnable and awe-inspiring fort
Of contemplation, the calm port
By reason fenced from winds that sigh
Among the restless sails of vanity.
But if no wish be hers that we should part,
A humbler bliss would satisfy my heart.
Where all things are so fair,
Enough by her dear side to breathe the air
Of this Elysian weather;
And, on or in, or near, the brook, espy
Shade upon the sunshine lying
Faint and somewhat pensively;
And downward Image gaily vying

Come closer to me;
Push close, my lovers, and take the best I possess;
Yield closer and closer, and give me the best you possess.

This is unfinish'd business with me--How is it with you?
(I was chill'd with the cold types, cylinder, wet paper between us.)

Male and Female!
I pass so poorly with paper and types, I must pass with the contact of bodies and souls.

American masses!
I do not thank you for liking me as I am, and liking the touch of me--I know that it is good for you to do so.

This is the carol of occupations;
In the labor of engines and trades, and the labor of fields, I find the developments,
And find the eternal meanings.

Workmen and Workwomen!
Were all educations, practical and ornamental, well display'd out of me, what would it amou...

Shut in with phantoms of life's hollow hopes,
And shadows of old sins satiety slew,
And the young ghosts of the dead dreams love knew,
Out of the day into the night she gropes.
Behind her, high the silvered summit slopes
Of strength and faith, she will not turn to view;
But towards the cave of weakness, harsh of hue,
She goes, where all the dropsied horror ropes.
There is a voice of waters in her ears,
And on her brow a wind that never dies:
One is the anguish of desired tears;
One is the sorrow of unuttered sighs;
And, burdened with the immemorial years,
Downward she goes with never lifted eyes.

Thou art home at last, my darling one,
    Flushed and tired with thy play,
From morning dawn until setting sun
    Hast thou been at sport away;
And thy steps are weary - hot thy brow,
    Yet thine eyes with joy are bright, -
Ah! I read the riddle, show me now
    The treasures thou graspest tight.

A pretty pebble, a tiny shell,
    A feather by wild bird cast,
Gay flowers gathered in forest dell,
    Already withering fast,
Four speckled eggs in a soft brown nest,
    Thy last and thy greatest prize,
Such the things that fill with joy thy breast,
    With laughing light thine eyes.

Ah! my child, what right have I to smile
    And whisper, too dearly bought,
By wand'ring many a weary mile -
    Dust, heat, and toilsome thought?

Beautiful lily, dwelling by still rivers,
    Or solitary mere,
Or where the sluggish meadow-brook delivers
    Its waters to the weir!

Thou laughest at the mill, the whir and worry
    Of spindle and of loom,
And the great wheel that toils amid the hurry
    And rushing of the flame.

Born in the purple, born to joy and pleasance,
    Thou dost not toil nor spin,
But makest glad and radiant with thy presence
    The meadow and the lin.

The wind blows, and uplifts thy drooping banner,
    And round thee throng and run
The rushes, the green yeomen of thy manor,
    The outlaws of the sun.

The burnished dragon-fly is thine attendant,
    And tilts against the field,
And down the listed sunbeam rides resplendent
    With stee...

Thank God for rest, where none molest,
And none can make afraid;
For Peace that sits as Plenty's guest
Beneath the homestead shade!
Bring pike and gun, the sword's red scourge,
The negro's broken chains,
And beat them at the blacksmith's forge
To ploughshares for our plains.
Alike henceforth our hills of snow,
And vales where cotton flowers;
All streams that flow, all winds that blow,
Are Freedom's motive-powers.
Henceforth to Labor's chivalry
Be knightly honors paid;
For nobler than the sword's shall be
The sickle's accolade.
Build up an altar to the Lord,
O grateful hearts of ours!
And shape it of the greenest sward
That ever drank the showers.
Lay all the bloom of gardens there,
And there the orchard fruits;
Bring golden grain ...

Should you ask me, whence these stories?
Whence these legends and traditions,
With the odors of the forest
With the dew and damp of meadows,
With the curling smoke of wigwams,
With the rushing of great rivers,
With their frequent repetitions,
And their wild reverberations
As of thunder in the mountains?
    I should answer, I should tell you,
"From the forests and the prairies,
From the great lakes of the Northland,
From the land of the Ojibways,
From the land of the Dacotahs,
From the mountains, moors, and fen-lands
Where the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,
Feeds among the reeds and rushes.
I repeat them as I heard them
From the lips of Nawadaha,
The musician, the sweet singer."
    Should you ask where Nawadaha
Found these songs so wild an...

Trust not Hope's illusive ray,
Trust not Joy's deceitful smiles;
Oft they reckless youth betray
With their bland, seductive wiles.

I have proved them all, alas!
Transient as the hues of eve;
Meteor-like, they quickly pass
Through the bosoms they deceive.

Let not Love thy prospects gild;
Soon they will be clouded o'er,
And the budding heart once chilled,
It can brightly bloom no more.

Slumber not in Pleasure's beam;
It may sparkle for a while,
But 'tis transient as a dream,
Faithless as a foeman's smile.

There's a light that's brighter far,
Soothes the soul by anguish riven,
'Tis Religion's guiding star
Glittering on the verge of Heaven.

Oh! this beam divine is worth
All the charm that life can give;
'...

At a point where the old road crosses
The river, and turns to the right,
I’d camped with the team; and the hosses
Was all fixed up for the night.
I’d been to the town to carry
A load to the Cudgegong;
And I’d taken the youngster, Harry,
On a trip as I’d promis’d him long.

I had seven more, and another
That died at the age of three;
But they all took arter the mother,
And Harry took arter me.
And from the tiniest laddie
’Twas always his fondest dream
To go on the roads with his daddy,
And help him to drive the team.

He was bright at the school and clever,
The best of the youngsters there;
And the teacher said there was never
A lad that promised so fair.
And I half forgot life’s battle,
An’ its long, hard-beaten road,
In...

To clothe the fiery thought
In simple words succeeds,
For still the craft of genius is
To mask a king in weeds.

Bountiful Givers,
I look along the years
And see the flowers you threw...
Anemones
And sprigs of gray
Sparse heather of the rocks,
Or a wild violet
Or daisy of a daisied field...
But each your best.

I might have worn them on my breast
To wilt in the long day...
I might have stemmed them in a narrow vase
And watched each petal sallowing...
I might have held them so - mechanically -
Till the wind winnowed all the leaves
And left upon my hands
A little smear of dust.

Instead
I hid them in the soft warm loam
Of a dim shadowed place...
Deep
In a still cool grotto,
Lit only by the memories of stars
And the wide and luminous eyes
Of dead poets
That love me and that I love...
Deep... deep...
Where none...

At the chill high tide of the night,
At the turn of the fluctuant hours,
When the waters of time are at height,
In a vision arose on my sight
The kingdoms of earth and the powers.

In a dream without lightening of eyes
I saw them, children of earth,
Nations and races arise,
Each one after his wise,
Signed with the sign of his birth.

Sound was none of their feet,
Light was none of their faces;
In their lips breath was not, or heat,
But a subtle murmur and sweet
As of water in wan waste places.

Pale as from passionate years,
Years unassuaged of desire,
Sang they soft in mine ears,
Crowned with jewels of tears,
Girt with girdles of fire.

A slow song beaten and broken,
As it were from the dust and the dead,
As o...

Emperors and Kings, how oft have temples rung
With impious thanksgiving, the Almighty's scorn!
How oft above their altars have been hung
Trophies that led the good and wise to mourn
Triumphant wrong, battle of battle born,
And sorrow that to fruitless sorrow clung!
Now, from Heaven-sanctioned victory, Peace is sprung;
In this firm hour Salvation lifts her horn.
Glory to arms! But, conscious that the nerve
Of popular reason, long mistrusted, freed
Your thrones, ye Powers, from duty fear to swerve!
Be just, be grateful; nor, the oppressor's creed
Reviving, heavier chastisement deserve
Than ever forced unpitied hearts to bleed.

What Nature, alas! has denied
To the delicate growth of our isle,
Art has in a measure supplied,
And winter is deck’d with a smile.
See, Mary, what beauties I bring
From the shelter of that sunny shed,
Where the flowers have the charms of the spring,
Though abroad they are frozen and dead.


‘Tis a bower of Arcadian sweets,
Where Flora is still in her prime,
A fortress to which she retreats
From the cruel assaults of the clime.
While earth wears a mantle of snow,
These pinks are as fresh and as gay
As the fairest and sweetest that blow
On the beautiful bosom of May.


See how they have safely survived
The frowns of a sky so severe;
Such Mary’s true love, that has lived
Through many a turbulent year.
The charms of the lat...

If I were a man, a young man, and knew what I know to-day,
I would look in the eyes of Life undaunted
    By any Fate that might threaten me.
I would give to the world what the world most wanted -
    Manhood that knows it can do and be;
    Courage that dares, and faith that can see
    Clear into the depths of the human soul,
    And find God there, and the ultimate goal,
If I were a man, a young man, and knew what I know to-day.

If I were a man, a young man, and knew what I know to-day,
    I would think of myself as the masterful creature
    Of all the Masterful plan;
    The Formless Cause, with form and feature;
    The Power that heeds not limit or ban;
    Man, wonderful man.
I would do good deeds, and forget them straightway;
    I would weave ...