Who does not feel desire unending
    To solace through his daily strife,
With some mysterious Mental Blending,
    The hungry loneliness of life?

Until, by sudden passion shaken,
    As terriers shake a rat at play,
He finds, all blindly, he has taken
    The old, Hereditary way.

Yet, in the moment of communion,
    The very heart of passion's fire,
His spirit spurns the mortal union,
    "Not this, not this, the Soul's desire!"

    *    *    *    *

Oh You, by whom my life is riven,
    And reft away from my control,
Take back the hours of passion given!
    Love me one moment from your soul.

Although I once, in ardent fashion,
    Implored you long to give me this;
(In hopes to stem, or stifle, passion)
    Y...

Address to Madame de la Sablière.[1]

You, Iris, 'twere an easy task to praise;
But you refuse the incense of my lays.
In this you are unlike all other mortals,
Who welcome all the praise that seeks their portals;
Not one who is not soothed by sound so sweet.
For me to blame this humour were not meet,
By gods and mortals shared in common,
And, in the main, by lovely woman.
That drink, so vaunted by the rhyming trade,
That cheers the god who deals the thunder-blow,
And oft intoxicates the gods below, -
The nectar, Iris, is of praises made.
You taste it not. But, in its place,
Wit, science, even trifles grace
Your bill of fare; but, for that matter,
The world will not believe the latter.
Well, leave the world in unbelief.
Still science,...

All ye, who in small bark have following sail'd,
Eager to listen, on the advent'rous track
Of my proud keel, that singing cuts its way,
Backward return with speed, and your own shores
Revisit, nor put out to open sea,
Where losing me, perchance ye may remain
Bewilder'd in deep maze. The way I pass
Ne'er yet was run: Minerva breathes the gale,
Apollo guides me, and another Nine
To my rapt sight the arctic beams reveal.
Ye other few, who have outstretch'd the neck.
Timely for food of angels, on which here
They live, yet never know satiety,
Through the deep brine ye fearless may put out
Your vessel, marking, well the furrow broad
Before you in the wave, that on both sides
Equal returns. Those, glorious, who pass'd o'er
To Colchos, wonder'd not as ye will do,...

Welcome home again, brave seaman! with thy thoughtful brow and gray,
And the old heroic spirit of our earlier, better day;
With that front of calm endurance, on whose steady nerve in vain
Pressed the iron of the prison, smote the fiery shafts of pain!
Is the tyrant's brand upon thee? Did the brutal cravens aim
To make God's truth thy falsehood, His holiest work thy shame?
When, all blood-quenched, from the torture the iron was withdrawn,
How laughed their evil angel the baffled fools to scorn!
They change to wrong the duty which God hath written out
On the great heart of humanity, too legible for doubt!
They, the loathsome moral lepers, blotched from footsole up to crown,
Give to shame what God hath given unto honor and renown!
Why, that brand is highest honor! than its traces ne...

THE TWILIGHT HOUR.

Slowly I dawn on the sleepless eye,
Like a dreaming thought of eternity;
But darkness hangs on my misty vest,
Like the shade of care on the sleeper's breast;
A light that is felt--but dimly seen,
Like hope that hangs life and death between;
And the weary watcher will sighing say,
"Lord, I thank thee! 'twill soon be day;"
The lingering night of pain is past,
Morning breaks in the east at last.

    Mortal!--thou mayst see in me
A type of feeble infancy,--
A dim, uncertain, struggling ray,
The promise of a future day!


THE MORNING HOUR.

    Like a maid on her bridal morn I rise,
With the smile on her lip and the tear in her eyes;
Whilst the breeze my crimson banner unfurls,
I wreathe my locks with the...

From an ode "In Commemoration of the Founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony."


The morn that breaks its heart of gold
Above the purple hills;
The eve, that spills
Its nautilus splendor where the sea is rolled;
The night, that leads the vast procession in
Of stars and dreams,
The beauty that shall never die or pass:
The winds, that spin
Of rain the misty mantles of the grass,
And thunder raiment of the mountain-streams;
The sunbeams, penciling with gold the dusk
Green cowls of ancient woods;
The shadows, thridding, veiled with musk,
The moon-pathed solitudes,
Call to my Fancy, saying, "Follow! follow!"
Till, following, I see,
Fair as a cascade in a rainbowed hollow,
A dream, a shape, take form,
Clad on with every charm,
The visi...

As aw hurried throo th' taan to mi wark,
(Aw wur lat, for all th' whistles had gooan,)
Aw happen'd to hear a remark,
'At ud fotch tears throo th' heart ov a stooan -
It wur raanin, an' snawin, and cowd,
An' th' flagstoans wur covered wi' muck,
An' th' east wind booath whistled an' howl'd,
It saanded like nowt but ill luck;
When two little lads, donn'd i' rags,
Baght stockins or shoes o' ther feet,
Coom trapesin away ower th' flags,
Booath on 'em sodden'd wi th' weet. -
Th' owdest mud happen be ten,
Th' young en be hauf on't, - noa moor;
As aw luk'd on, aw sed to misen,
God help fowk this weather 'at's poor!
Th' big en sam'd summat off th' graand,
An' aw luk'd just to see what 't could be;
'Twur a few wizend flaars he'd faand,
An' they seem'd to ...

AHASUERAS

Tell me thy name!

ESTHER

My name, great sire, is Esther.

AHASUERAS

So thou art Esther?    Esther! 'tis a name
Breathed into sound as softly as a sigh.
A woman's name should melt upon the lips
Like Love's first kisses, and thy countenance
Is fit companion for so sweet a name!

ESTHER

Thou art most kind.    I would my name and face
Were mine own making and not accident.
Then I might feel elated at thy praise,
Where now I feel confusion.

AHASUERAS

    Thou hast wit
As well as beauty, Esther.    Both are gems
That do embellish woman in man's sight.
Yet they are gems of second magnitude!
Dost THOU possess the one great perfect gem -
The matchless jewel of the world called LOVE?<...

    Oh hear!    Oh hear!
    Across the sullen tide
    Across the echoing dome horizon-wide
    What pulse of fear
    Beats with tremendous boom!
    What call of instant doom,
    With thunderstroke of terror and of pride,
    With urgency that may not be denied,
    Reverberates upon the heart's own drum
    Come! . . .    Come! . . . for thou must come!

    Come forth, O Soul!
    This is thy day of power.
    This is the day and this the glorious hour
    That was the goal
    Of thy self-conquering strife.
    The love of child and wife,
    The fields of Earth and the wide ways of Thought--
    Did not thy purpose count them all as nought
    That in this moment thou thyself mayst give
    And in thy country's life for ever live?

S' i' avessi creduto.


Had I but earlier known that from the eyes
        Of that bright soul that fires me like the sun,
        I might have drawn new strength my race to run,
        Burning as burns the phoenix ere it dies;
Even as the stag or lynx or leopard flies
        To seek his pleasure and his pain to shun,
        Each word, each smile of her would I have won,
        Flying where now sad age all flight denies.
Yet why complain? For even now I find
        In that glad angel's face, so full of rest,
        Health and content, heart's ease and peace of mind
Perchance I might have been less simply blest,
        Finding her sooner: if 'tis age alone
        That lets me soar with her to seek God's throne.

I come from a land in the sun bright deep,
    Where golden gardens grow;
Where the winds of the north, be calmed in sleep,
    Their conch-shells never blow.[1]
        Haste to that holy Isle with me,
            Haste--haste!

So near the track of the stars are we,
    That oft on night's pale beams
The distant sounds of their harmony
    Come to our ear, like dreams.
        Then haste to that holy Isle with me, etc.

The Moon too brings her world so nigh,
    That when the night-seer looks
To that shadowless orb, in a vernal sky,
    He can number its hills and brooks.
                Then, haste, etc.

To the Sun-god all our hearts and lyres[2]
    By day, by night, belong;
And the breath we draw from his li...

“Tandem venias precamur
Nube candentes humeros amictus
Augur Apollo.”


Lord of the golden lyre
Fraught with the Dorian fire,
Oh! fair-haired child of Leto, come again;
And if no longer smile
Delphi or Delos’ isle,
Come from the depth of thine Aetnean glen,
Where in the black ravine
Thunders the foaming green
Of waters writhing far from mortals’ ken;
Come o’er the sparkling brine,
And bring thy train divine,
The sweet-voiced and immortal violet-crownèd Nine.

For here are richer meads,
And here are goodlier steeds
Than ever graced the glorious land of Greece;
Here waves the yellow corn,
Here is the olive born,
The gray-green gracious harbinger of peace;
Here too hath taken root
A tree with golden fruit,
...

You that have snarled through the ages, take your answer and go--
I know your hoary question, the riddle that all men know.
You have weighed the stars in a balance, and grasped the skies in a span:
Take, if you must have answer, the word of a common man.

Deep in my life lies buried one love unhealed, unshriven,
One hunger still shall haunt me--yea, in the streets of heaven;
This is the burden, babbler, this is the curse shall cling,
This is the thing I bring you; this is the pleasant thing.

'Gainst you and all your sages, no joy of mine shall strive,
This one dead self shall shatter the men you call alive.
My grief I send to smite you, no pleasure, no belief,
Lord of the battered grievance, what do you know of grief?

I only know the praises to heaven that one ma...

I will throw by my book. The weariness
Of too much study presses on my brain,
And thought's close fetter binds upon my brow
Like a distraction, and I must give o'er.
Morning hath seen me here, and noon, and eve;
And midnight with its deep and solemn hush
Has look'd upon my labors, and the dawn,
With its sweet voices, and its tempting breath
Has driven me to rest - and I can bear
The burden of such weariness no more.
I have foregone society, and fled
From a sweet sister's fondness, and from all
A home's alluring blandishments, and now
When I am thirsting for them, and my heart
Would leap at the approaches of their kind
And gentle offices, they are not here,
And I must feel that I am all alone.
Oh, for the fame of this forgetful world
How much we suffe...

There is a shame of nobleness
Confronting sudden pelf, --
A finer shame of ecstasy
Convicted of itself.

A best disgrace a brave man feels,
Acknowledged of the brave, --
One more "Ye Blessed" to be told;
But this involves the grave.

Upon the plain of Dura stood an image great and high,
With golden forehead broad and bright beneath the morning sky;
All regal in its majesty and kingly in its mien,
The grandest and most glorious thing the world had ever seen!

Full sixty cubits high in air the lordly head was reared,
And robed in gold from head to foot the stately form appeared;
Adown the breast six cubits broad, a flood of yellow gold,
All deftly wrought with matchless skill, its shining tresses rolled.

And, fronting thus the rising sun, it sent back ray for ray -
A golden flood of arrowy light - into-the face of day;
While round its feet, in awe and dread, all Shinar stood amazed,
And up into that radiant face with reverent wonder gazed.

Woke sackbut, psaltery, and harp, woke dulcimer and flu...

1.
Mine eyes were dim with tears unshed;
Yes, I was firm - thus wert not thou; -
My baffled looks did fear yet dread
To meet thy looks - I could not know
How anxiously they sought to shine
With soothing pity upon mine.

2.
To sit and curb the soul's mute rage
Which preys upon itself alone;
To curse the life which is the cage
Of fettered grief that dares not groan,
Hiding from many a careless eye
The scorned load of agony.

3.
Whilst thou alone, then not regarded,
The ... thou alone should be,
To spend years thus, and be rewarded,
As thou, sweet love, requited me
When none were near - Oh! I did wake
From torture for that moment's sake.

4.
Upon my heart thy accents sweet
Of peace and pity fell like dew
On f...

Darling child, to thee I owe,
More than others here will know;
Thou hast cheered my weary days,
With thy coy and winsome ways.
When my heart has been most sad,
Smile of thine has made me glad;
In return, I wish for thee,
Health and sweet felicity.
May thy future days be blest,
With all things the world deems best.
If perchance the day should come,
Thou does leave thy childhood's home;
Bound by earth's most sacred ties,
With responsibilities,
In another's life to share,
Wedded joys and worldly care;
May thy partner worthy prove, -
Richest in thy constant love.
Strong in faith and honour, just, -
With brave heart on which to trust.
One, to whom when troubles come,
And the days grow burdensome,
Thou canst fly, with confidence
In...