Susanna Moodie

Offspring of heaven, fair Freedom! impart
The light of thy spirit to quicken each heart.
Though the chains of oppression our free limbs ne'er bound,
Bid us feel for the wretch round whose soul they are wound;
Whose breast is corroded with anguish so deep
That the eye of the slave is too blood-shot to weep;
No balm from the fountain of nature will flow
When the mind is degraded by fetter and blow.

    The friends of humanity nobly have striven,
But the bonds of the heart-broken slave are unriven!
Whilst Religion extends o'er those champions her shield,
May they never to party or prejudice yield
The glorious cause by all freemen espoused.
A light shines abroad and the lion is roused;
The crush of the iron has struck fire from the stone;
Bid them back to the cha...

Autumn, thy rushing blast
    Sweeps in wild eddies by,
Whirling the sear leaves past,
    Beneath my feet, to die.
Nature her requiem sings
    In many a plaintive tone,
As to the wind she flings
    Sad music, all her own.

The murmur of the rill
    Is hoarse and sullen now,
And the voice of joy is still
    In grove and leafy bough.
There's not a single wreath,
    Of all Spring's thousand flowers,
To strew her bier in death,
    Or deck her faded bowers.

I hear a spirit sigh
    Where the meeting pines resound,
Which tells me all must die,
    As the leaf dies on the ground.
The brightest hopes we cherish,
    Which own a mortal trust,
But bloom awhile to perish
    And moulder in the dust.

Sweep on...

    Born with the sun, the fair daughters of time,
We silently lead to a lovelier clime,
Where the day is undimmed by the shadows of night,
But eternally beams from the fountain of light;
Where the sorrows of time and its cares are unknown
To the beautiful forms that encircle the throne
Of the mighty Creator! the First and the Last!
Who the wonderful frame of the universe cast,
And composed every link of the mystical chain
Of minutes, and hours, which are numbered in vain
By the children of dust, in their frantic career,
When their moments are wasted unthinkingly here,
Lavished on earth which in mercy were given
That men might prepare for the joys of heaven!--

Sinking now in floods of light,
The sun resigns the world to night;
When a lingering glance he turns,
The glowing west with glory burns,
And the blushing heavens awhile
Long retain his parting smile.
Ere gray evening's sullen eye,
Bids those tints of beauty die;
Ere her tears have washed away
The footsteps of departing day,
Nature from her verdant bowers
Her last long strain of rapture pours;
Shrouded in her misty vest,
She sings a drowsy world to rest,
And tells to man, in thrilling strains,
That the Lord Jehovah reigns!

    Lingering twilight dies away,
Night resumes her ancient sway,
Round her sable tresses twining
Countless hosts of stars are shining;
Weaving round the brow of night
A coronet of living light:
O'er the co...

Oh ye! who all life's energies combine
The fadeless laurel round your brows to twine,
Pause but one moment in your brief career,
Nor seek for glory in a mortal sphere.
Can figures traced upon the shifting sand
Washed by the mighty tide, its force withstand?
Time's stern resistless torrent onward flows,
The restless waves above your labours close,
And He who bids the bounding billows roll
Sweeps out the feeble record from the soul.

    The glorious hues that flush the evening sky
Melt into night, and on her bosom die;
Through the wide fields of heaven's immensity
The gold-tipped billows of that crimson sea
Flash on the awe-struck gazer's dazzled sight,
The rich out-gushings from the fount of light;
Yet oft, concealed beneath that splendid form,
We ha...

POET.

Enchanting spirit! at thy votive shrine
I lowly bend one simple wreath to twine;
O come from thy ideal world and fling
Thy airy fingers o'er my rugged string;
Sweep the dark chords of thought and give to earth
The wild sweet song that tells thy heavenly birth--


FANCY.

Happiness, when from earth she fled,
    I passed on her heaven-ward flight,--
"Take this wreath," the spirit said,
    "And bathe it in floods of light;
To the sons of sorrow this token give,
And bid them follow my steps and live!"

I took the wreath from her radiant hand,
    Each flower was a silver star;
I turned this dark earth to a fairy land,
    When I hither drove my car;
But I wove the wreath round my tresses bright,
And man only saw its...

My eyes have seen another spring
    In floral beauty rise,
And happy birds on gladsome wing
    Flit through the azure skies.
Though sickness bowed my feeble frame
    Through winter's cheerless hours,
Life's sinking torch resumes its flame
    With renovated powers.

Once more on nature's ample shrine,
    Beneath the spreading boughs,
With lifted hands and hopes divine
    I offer up my vows.
My incense is the breath of flowers,
    Perfuming all the air;
My pillared fane these woodland bowers,
    A heaven-built house of prayer;

My fellow-worshippers, the gay,
    Free songsters of the grove,
Who to the closing eye of day
    Warble their hymns of love.
The low and dulcet lyre of spring,
    Swept by the vagrant breeze,<...

Like a dew-drop from heaven in the ocean of life,
    From the morn's rosy diadem falling,
A stranger as yet to the storms and the strife,
    Dear babe, of thy earthly calling!

Thine eyes have unclosed on this valley of tears;
    Hark! that cry is the herald of anguish and woe;
Thy young spirit finds a deep voice for its fears,
    Prophetic of all that is passing below.

How short will the term of thy ignorance be!
    The winds and the tempests will rise,
And passion will cover with wrecks the calm sea,
On whose surface no shadow now lies.

Unclouded and fair is the morn of thy birth,
    The first lovely day in a season of gloom;
Whilst a pilgrim and stranger thou treadest this earth,
    May the sunbeams of hope gild thy path to the tomb.

"What hast thou seen in the olden time,
    Dark ruin, lone and gray?"
"Full many a race from thy native clime,
    And the bright earth, pass away.
The organ has pealed in these roofless aisles,
    And priests have knelt to pray
At the altar, where now the daisy smiles
    O'er their silent beds of clay.

"I've seen the strong man a wailing child,
    By his mother offered here;
I've seen him a warrior fierce and wild;
    I've seen him on his bier,
His warlike harness beside him laid
    In the silent earth to rust;
His plumed helm and trusty blade
    To moulder into dust!

"I've seen the stern reformer scorn
    The things once deemed divine,
And the bigot's zeal with gems adorn
    The altar's sacred shrine.
I've seen the si...

Oh nature! though the blast is yelling,
    Loud roaring through the bending tree,
There's sorrow in man's darksome dwelling,
    There's rapture still with thee!

I gaze upon the clouds wind-driven,
    The white storm-crested deep;
My heart with human cares is riven--
    O'er these--I cannot weep.

'Tis not the rush of wave or wind
    That wakes my anxious fears,
That presses on my troubled mind,
    And fills my eyes with tears;

I feel the icy breath of sorrow
    My ardent spirit chill,
The dark--dark presage of the morrow,
    The sense of coming ill.

I hear the mighty billows rave;
    There's music in their roar,
When strong in wrath the wind-lashed wave
    Springs on the groaning shore;

A solemn pleasu...

Oh Love! how fondly, tenderly enshrined
In human hearts, how with our being twined!
Immortal principle, in mercy given,
The brightest mirror of the joys of heaven.
Child of Eternity's unclouded clime,
Too fair for earth, too infinite for time:
A seraph watching o'er Death's sullen shroud,
A sunbeam streaming through a stormy cloud;
An angel hovering o'er the paths of life,
But sought in vain amidst its cares and strife;
Claimed by the many--known but to the few
Who keep thy great Original in view;
Who, void of passion's dross, behold in thee
A glorious attribute of Deity!

"He will come to night," young Mary said,
    And checked the rising sigh;
And gazed on the stars that o'er her head
    Shone out in the deep blue sky.
"Heaven speed his voyage!--though absent long,
    The painful vigil's o'er--
The skies are clear--the breeze is strong--
    We meet to part no more!"

While yet she spoke a sudden chill
    O'er her ardent spirit crept;
A sad presentiment of ill--
    She turned away and wept.
Far off the sigh of ocean stole--
    The sweeping of the sounding surge--
In plaintive murmurs o'er her soul,
    Like wailing of a funeral dirge.

And in the wind there is a tone
    Which whispers to her sinking heart--
"Mary we meet in death alone;
    In realms of bliss no more to part."
The moon has ...

O'er Time's mighty billows borne,
Angels lead the purple morn;
Chasing far the shades of night
From the burning throne of light:
Where their glorious wings unfold,
There the east is streaked with gold;
Gilding with celestial dyes
The azure curtain of the skies.
High in air their matin song
Floats the ethereal fields along;
Ere creation wakes they sing,
Glory to the eternal King!
Till silent woods and sleeping plains
Echo far, Jehovah reigns!

    Rising from the arms of night,
Nature hails the birth of light;
Smiling sweetly through her tears,
High her verdant crown she rears;
At her call the sunny hours
Wreathe her humid locks with flowers;
Bright with many a lucid gem
Shines her spotless diadem:
Every grove hath found a voi...

    I come, like Oblivion, to sweep away
The scattered beams from the car of day:
The gems which the evening has lavishly strown
Light up the lamps round my ebon throne.
Slowly I float through the realms of space,
Casting my mantle o'er Nature's face,
Weaving the stars in my raven hair,
As I sail through the shadowy fields of air.
All the wild fancies that thought can bring
Lie hid in the folds of my sable wing:
Terror is mine with his phrensied crew,
Fear with her cheek of marble hue,
And sorrow, that shuns the eye of day,
Pours out to me her plaintive lay.
I am the type of that awful gloom
Which involves the cradle and wraps the tomb;
Chilling the soul with its mystical sway;
Chasing the day-dreams of beauty away;
Till man views the banner by me un...

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...

O come to the meadows! I'll show you where
    Primrose and violet blow,
And the hawthorn spreads its blossoms fair,
    White as the driven snow.
I'll show you where the daisies dot
    With silver stars the lea,
The orchis, and forget-me-not,
    The flower of memory!

The gold-cup and the meadow-sweet,
    That love the river's side,
The reed that bows the wave to meet,
    And sighs above the tide.
The stately flag that gaily rears
    Aloft its yellow crest,
The lily in whose cup the tears
    Of morn delight to rest.

The first in Nature's dainty wreath,
    We'll cull the brier-rose,
The crowfoot and the purple heath,
    And pink that sweetly blows.
The hare-bell with its airy flowers
    Shall deck my Laura's breast,...

Rejoice O my people! Jehovah hath spoken!
The dark chain of sin and oppression is broken;
Thy warfare is over, thy bondage is past,
The Lord hath looked down on his chosen at last.
A voice from the wilderness breaks on mine ear--
O Israel, rejoice! thy redemption is near:
A path for our God the wild desert shall yield;
He comes in the light of salvation revealed;
His word hath declared, who speaks not in vain;
He bends the high mountain, exalts the low plain;
All flesh shall behold him, far nations shall bring
Their glad songs of triumph to welcome their King!

    As the grass of the field in the morning is green,
So man, in his beauty and vigour, is seen
A perishing glory, the beam of a day,
A flower that will fade with the evening away:
The breath of t...

O mighty God! our fathers told
    The wondrous works thou didst of yore;
Thy glories in the days of old,
    Wrought on proud Egypt's hostile shore.
Thy wrath swept through that guilty land;
    Before thy face the heathen fled;
His people, with an outstretched hand,
    The Lord of Hosts in triumph led!

It was not counsel, spear, nor sword,
    A heritage for Israel won;
It was Jehovah's awful word
    That led our conquering armies on.
The heathen host--their warriors brave--
    Were scattered when the Lord arose;
At his terrific glance, a grave
    Was found by Jacob's haughty foes!

God of our strength! Almighty Power!
    Our sure defence, our sword and shield,
Still guide our hosts in danger's hour,
    Still lead our armies t...