I.

    Cease, Augusta! cease thy mourning,
        Happy days appear,
    Godlike Albion is returning,
        Loyal hearts to cheer!
    Every grace his youth adorning,
    Glorious as the star of morning,
        Or the planet of the year.

II.

    Albion, by the nymph attended,
    Was to Neptune recommended,
        Peace and plenty spread the sails:
    Venus, in her shell before him,
    From the sands in safety bore him,
        And supplied Etesian gales.
    Archon on the shore commanding,
    Lowly met him at his landing,
        Crowds of people swarm'd around;
    Welcome, rang like peals of thunder,
    Welcome, rent the skies asunder,
        Welcome, heaven and earth resound.

III.

    In...

The strength of twice three thousand horse
That seeks the single goal;
The line that holds the rending course,
The hate that swings the whole;
The stripped hulls, slinking through the gloom,
At gaze and gone again,
The Brides of Death that wait the groom,
The Choosers of the Slain!

Offshore where sea and skyline blend
In rain, the daylight dies;
The sullen, shouldering swells attend
Night and our sacrifice.
Adown the stricken capes no flare,
No mark on spit or bar,,
Girdled and desperate we dare
The blindfold game of war.

Nearer the up-flung beams that spell
The council of our foes;
Clearer the barking guns that tell
Their scattered flank to close.
Sheer to the trap they crowd their way
From ports for this unbarred.
Qu...

(FOR THE BEATRICE CELEBRATION, 1890)

Nine mystic revolutions of the spheres
Since Dante's birth, and lo! a star new-born
Shining in heaven: and like a lark at morn
Springing to meet it, straight in all men's ears,
A strange new song, which through the listening years
Grew deep as lonely sobbing from the thorn
Rising at eve, shot through with bitter scorn,
Full-throated with the ecstasy of tears.

Long since that star arose, that song upsprang,
That shine and sing in heaven above us yet;
Since thy white childhood, glorious Beatrice,
Dawned like a blessed angel upon his:
Thy star it was that did his song beget,
Star shining for us still because he sang.

O, richly soiled and richly sunned,
Exuberant, fervid, and fecund!
Is this the fixed condition
On which may Northern pilgrim come,
To imbibe thine ether-air, and sum
Thy store of old tradition?
Must we be chill, if clean, and stand
Foot-deep in dirt on classic land?

So is it: in all ages so,
And in all places man can know,
From homely roots unseen below
The stem in forest, field, and bower,
Derives the emanative power
That crowns it with the ethereal flower,
From mixtures foetid, foul, and sour
Draws juices that those petals fill.

Ah Nature, if indeed thy will
Thou own’st it, it shall not be ill!
And truly here, in this quick clime,
Where, scarcely bound by space or time,
The elements in half a day
Toss off with exquisitest...

Go, foolish thoughts, and join the throng
Of myriads gone before;
To flutter and flap and flit along
The airy limbo shore.

Go, words of sport and words of wit,
Sarcastic point and fine,
And words of wisdom, wholly fit
With folly’s to combine.

Go, words of wisdom, words of sense,
Which, while the heart belied,
The tongue still uttered for pretence,
The inner blank to hide.

Go, words of wit, so gay, so light,
That still were meant express
To soothe the smart of fancied slight
By fancies of success.

Go, broodings vain o’er fancied wrong;
Go, love-dreams vainer still;
And scorn that’s not, but would be, strong;
And Pride without a Will.

Go, foolish thoughts, and find your way
Where myriads went before,
To...

A Sense of sadness in the golden air,
A pensiveness, that has no part in care,
As if the Season, by some woodland pool,
Braiding the early blossoms in her hair,
Seeing her loveliness reflected there,
Had sighed to find herself so beautiful.

A breathlessness, a feeling as of fear,
Holy and dim as of a mystery near,
As if the World about us listening went,
With lifted finger, and hand-hollowed ear,
Hearkening a music that we cannot hear,
Haunting the quickening earth and firmament.

A prescience of the soul that has no name,
Expectancy that is both wild and tame,
As if the Earth, from out its azure ring
Of heavens, looked to see, as white as flame,
As Perseus once to chained Andromeda came,
The swift, divine revealment of the Spring.

With triumph, this morning, oh Boston! I hail
The stir of thy deck and the spread of thy sail,
For they tell me I soon shall be wafted, in thee,
To the flourishing isle of the brave and the free,
And that chill Nova-Scotia's unpromising strand
Is the last I shall tread of American land.
Well--peace to the land! may her sons know, at length,
That in high-minded honor lies liberty's strength,
That though man be as free as the fetterless wind,
As the wantonest air that the north can unbind,
Yet, if health do not temper and sweeten the blast,
If no harvest of mind ever sprung where it past,
Then unblest is such freedom, and baleful its might,--
Free only to ruin, and strong but to blight!

Farewell to the few I have left with regret:
May they sometimes recall, wha...

        I saw two sowers in Life's field at morn,
        To whom came one in angel guise and said,
        "Is it for labour that a man is born?
        Lo:    I am Ease.    Come ye and eat my bread!"
        Then gladly one forsook his task undone
        And with the Tempter went his slothful way,
        The other toiled until the setting sun
        With stealing shadows blurred the dusty day.

        Ere harvest time, upon earth's peaceful breast
        Each laid him down among the unreaping dead.
        "Labour hath other recompense than rest,
        Else were the toiler like the fool," I said;
        "God meteth him not less, but rather more
        Because he sowed and others reaped his store."

"A hunter of shadows, himself a shade."--HOMER.


Oh! weary sleeper by the lone sea-shore,
    Where billows toil for ever 'mid the rocks,
    Scourged on by winds in stormy equinox,
Rise! rise in haste, or slumber evermore!
    The stern Earth calls thee, and the Ocean mocks;
    Roll thy poor sightless orbs about the sky,
    Through tears of blind and powerless agony;
Rise! rise in haste, or slumber evermore!

Ay! blind I stand beside the lone sea-shore;
    Hearing the mighty murmur of the waves,
    Shaking with giant arms earth's architraves,
Scaling the riven cloud-crags bald and boar,
    Surging hoarse secrets through the central caves;
    God! shall thine ocean undiscernèd roll,
    Night on mine eyes, and darkness on my soul,
Groping...

("Ah! je le tiens enfin.")

[CROMWELL, Act II., October, 1827.]


THURLOW communicates the intention of Parliament to
offer CROMWELL the crown.

CROMWELL. And is it mine? And have my feet at length
Attained the summit of the rock i' the sand?

THURLOW. And yet, my lord, you have long reigned.

CROM.        Nay, nay!
Power I have 'joyed, in sooth, but not the name.
Thou smilest, Thurlow. Ah, thou little know'st
What hole it is Ambition digs i' th' heart
What end, most seeming empty, is the mark
For which we fret and toil and dare! How hard
With an unrounded fortune to sit down!
Then, what a lustre from most ancient times
Heaven has flung o'er the sacred head of kings!
King - Majesty - what names of power! No ki...

A DRUID.


Sweet smiles the May!

The forest gay

From frost and ice is freed;

No snow is found,

Glad songs resound

Across the verdant mead.

Upon the height

The snow lies light,

Yet thither now we go,
There to extol our Father's name,

Whom we for ages know.
Amid the smoke shall gleam the flame;

Thus pure the heart will grow.

THE DRUIDS.

Amid the smoke shall gleam the flame;
Extol we now our Father's name,

Whom we for ages know!

Up, up, then, let us go!

ONE OF THE PEOPLE.

Would ye, then, so rashly act?
Would ye instant death attract?
Know ye not the cruel threats

Of the victors we obey?
Round about are placed thei...

"While it was yet dark."

Mary of Magdala, when the moon had set,
Forth to the garden that was with night dews wet,
Fared in the dark - woe-wan and bent was she,
'Neath many pounds' weight of fragrant spicery.

Mary of Magdala, in her misery,
"Who shall roll the stone up from yon door?" quoth she;
And trembling down the steep she went, and wept sore,
Because her dearest Lord was, alas! no more.

Her burden she let fall, lo! the stone was gone;
Light was there within, out to the dark it shone;
With an angel's face the dread tomb was bright,
The which she beholding fell for sore affright.

Mary of Magdala, in her misery,
Heard the white vision speak, and did straightway flee;
And an idle tale seem'd the wild words she said,
And nought ...

We may roam thro' this world, like a child at a feast,
Who but sips of a sweet, and then flies to the rest;
And, when pleasure begins to grow dull in the east,
We may order our wings and be off to the west;
But if hearts that feel, and eyes that smile,
Are the dearest gifts that heaven supplies,
We never need leave our own green isle,
For sensitive hearts, and for sun-bright eyes.
Then remember, wherever your goblet is crowned,
Thro' this world, whether eastward or westward you roam,
When a cup to the smile of dear woman goes round,
Oh! remember the smile which adorns her at home.

In England, the garden of Beauty is kept
By a dragon of prudery placed within call;
But so oft this unamiable dragon has slept,
That the garden's but carelessly watched after all.

L' aspetto sacro della terra vostra.

THE VIEW OF ROME PROMPTS HIM TO TEAR HIMSELF FROM LAURA, BUT LOVE WILL NOT ALLOW HIM.


    The solemn aspect of this sacred shore
Wakes for the misspent past my bitter sighs;
'Pause, wretched man! and turn,' as conscience cries,
Pointing the heavenward way where I should soar.
But soon another thought gets mastery o'er
The first, that so to palter were unwise;
E'en now the time, if memory err not, flies,
When we should wait our lady-love before.
I, for his aim then well I apprehend,
Within me freeze, as one who, sudden, hears
News unexpected which his soul offend.
Returns my first thought then, that disappears;
Nor know I which shall conquer, but till now
Within me they contend, nor hope of rest allow!

A MIDDLE-AGE INTERLUDE.


I.

PREADMONISHETH THE ABBOT DEODAET.

The Lord, we look to once for all,
Is the Lord we should look at, all at once:
He knows not to vary, saith Saint Paul,
Nor the shadow of turning, for the nonce.
See him no other than as he is:
Give both the infinitudes their due,
Infinite mercy, but, I wis,
As infinite a justice too.
[Organ: plagal-cadence.]
As infinite a justice too.

II.

ONE SINGETH.

John, Master of the Temple of God,
Falling to sin the Unknown Sin,
What he bought of Emperor Aldabrod,
He sold it to Sultan Saladin,
Till, caught by Pope Clement, a-buzzing there,
Hornet-prince of the mad wasps’ hive,
And clipt of his wings in Paris square,
They bring him now...

Catching the sunbeams, oh, wee dimpled child,
    Gleefully laughing because they are bright;
Knowing, ah! never, my beautiful pet,
    Ne'er can our fingers imprison the light.

Beautiful sunshine, oh! fair is the light
    Falling on earth from the heavens above;
Beautiful childhood, oh! glad is the sight
    Filling the world with its measure of love.

Playing with sunbeams, oh, all of us, pet,
    Toy with the treasures, so shining and bright;
Catching the sunshine we never may hold,
    Trying like you, to imprison the light.

Sunbeams that glitter and sparkle and shine--
    Life is so full of the beautiful light;
Gilding the wings of each fleet-footed day
    Only to fade in the shadows of night.

Playing with sunbeams, oh! all of us...

Blest Spirit of Calm that dwellest in these woods!
Thou art a part of that serene repose
That ofttimes lingers in the solitudes
Of my lone heart, when the tumultuous throes
Of some vast Grief have borne me to the earth.
For I have fought with Sorrow face to face;
Have tasted of the cup that brings to some
A frantic madness and delirious mirth,
But prayed and trusted for the light to come,
To break the gloom and darkness of the place.
Through the dim aisles the sunlight penetrates,
And nature's self rejoices; heaven's light
Comes down into my heart, and in its might
My soul stands up and knocks at God's own temple-gates.

Lines Found Among The Papers Of A Harvard Undergraduate

The bloom that lies on Fanny's cheek
Is all my Latin, all my Greek;
The only sciences I know
Are frowns that gloom and smiles that glow;
Siberia and Italy
Lie in her sweet geography;
No scholarship have I but such
As teaches me to love her much.

Why should I strive to read the skies,
Who know the midnight of her eyes?
Why should I go so very far
To learn what heavenly bodies are!
Not Berenice's starry hair
With Fanny's tresses can compare;
Not Venus on a cloudless night,
Enslaving Science with her light,
Ever reveals so much as when
SHE stares and droops her lids again.

If Nature's secrets are forbidden
To mortals, she may keep them hidden.
AEons and aeons we pro...