Silently without my window,
Tapping gently at the pane,
Falls the rain.
Through the trees sighs the breeze
Like a soul in pain.
Here alone I sit and weep;
Thought hath banished sleep.

Wearily I sit and listen
To the water's ceaseless drip.
To my lip
Fate turns up the bitter cup,
Forcing me to sip;
'T is a bitter, bitter drink,
Thus I sit and think,--

Thinking things unknown and awful,
Thoughts on wild, uncanny themes,
Waking dreams.
Spectres dark, corpses stark,
Show the gaping seams
Whence the cold and cruel knife
Stole away their life.

Bloodshot eyes all strained and staring,
Gazing ghastly into mine;
Blood like wine
On the brow--clotted now--
Shows death's dreadful sign.
Lonely vigil still ...

    How sweet the brazen belfries chime
        Across the hills and through the dales,
        And o'er the breasts of meadowed vales,
    Beneath the smiles of Christmas time!
    Rough sorrow's thorny fingers grow
        As soft and waxen as a child's,
        And balmy pleasures o'er the wilds
    Chant music to the drifting snow.

    Ah, scattered locks that fringe my face,
        With wintry wisps of white and gray!
        Ah, sad, dimmed eyes that look away
    To artless childhood's tender grace!
    To-night those years with joys sublime
        Steal over me and fill my soul
        With lullabies of bliss that roll
    The golden glees of Christmas time.

    Again I live in wondrous days,
        When baby hands with chubby glee<...

Pray, what can dreams avail
To make love or to mar?
The child within the cradle rail
Lies dreaming of the star.
But is the star by this beguiled
To leave its place and seek the child?

The poor plucked rose within its glass
Still dreameth of the bee;
But, tho' the lagging moments pass,
Her Love she may not see.
If dream of child and flower fail,
Why should a maiden's dreams prevail?

The light has left the hill-side. Yesterday
These skies shewed blue against the dusky trees,
The leaves' soft murmur in the evening breeze
Was music, and the waves danced in the bay.
Then was my heart, as ever, far away
With you, - and I could see you as one sees
A mirrored face, - and happiness and ease
And hope were mine, in spite of long delay.

After these months of waiting, this is all!
Hope, dead, lies coffined, shrouded in despair,
With all the blessings of the outer air
Forgot, 'neath the black covering of a pall.
Only the darkening of the woodland ways,
A heart's low moaning over wasted days.

1 Generous, gay, and gallant nation,
Bold in arms, and bright in arts;
Land secure from all invasion,
All but Cupid's gentle darts!
From your charms, oh! who would run?
Who would leave you for the sun?
Happy soil, adieu, adieu!

2 Let old charmers yield to new;
In arms, in arts, be still more shining:
All your joys be still increasing;
All your tastes be still refining;
All your jars for ever ceasing;
But let old charmers yield to new:
Happy soil, adieu, adieu!

Old April wanes, and her last dewy morn
Her death-bed steeps in tears:--to hail the May
New blooming blossoms 'neath the sun are born,
And all poor April's charms are swept away.
The early primrose, peeping once so gay,
Is now chok'd up with many a mounting weed,
And the poor violet we once admir'd
Creeps in the grass unsought for--flowers succeed,
Gaudy and new, and more to be desired,
And of the old the school-boy seemeth tired.
So with us all, poor April, as with thee!
Each hath his day;--the future brings my fears:
Friends may grow weary, new flowers rising be,
And my last end, like thine, be steep'd in tears.

Towards the hills of Jamberoo
Some few fantastic shadows haste,
Uplit with fires
Like castle spires
Outshining through a mirage waste.
Behold, a mournful glory sits
On feathered ferns and woven brakes,
Where sobbing wild like restless child
The gusty breeze of evening wakes!
Methinks I hear on every breath
A lofty tone go passing by,
That whispers “Weave,
Though wood winds grieve,
The fadeless blooms of Poesy!”

A spirit hand has been abroad
An evil hand to pluck the flowers
A world of wealth,
And blooming health
Has gone from fragrant seaside bowers.
The twilight waxeth dim and dark,
The sad waves mutter sounds of woe,
But the evergreen retains its sheen,
And happy hearts exist below;
But pleasure sparkles on the sward,...

("Sara, belle d'indolence.")

[XIX., August, 1828.]


In a swinging hammock lying,
    Lightly flying,
Zara, lovely indolent,
O'er a fountain's crystal wave
    There to lave
Her young beauty - see her bent.

As she leans, so sweet and soft,
    Flitting oft,
O'er the mirror to and fro,
Seems that airy floating bat,
    Like a feather
From some sea-gull's wing of snow.

Every time the frail boat laden
    With the maiden
Skims the water in its flight,
Starting from its trembling sheen,
    Swift are seen
A white foot and neck so white.

As that lithe foot's timid tips
    Quick she dips,
Passing, in the rippling pool,
(Blush, oh! snowiest ivory!)
    Frolic, she
Laughs to feel th...

[1]

A man that loved, - and loved his wife, -
Still led an almost joyless life.
No tender look, nor gracious word,
Nor smile, that, coming from a bride,
Its object would have deified,
E'er told her doting lord
The love with which he burn'd
Was in its kind return'd.
Still unrepining at his lot,
This man, thus tied in Hymen's knot,
Thank'd God for all the good he got.
But why? If love doth fail to season
Whatever pleasures Hymen gives,
I'm sure I cannot see the reason
Why one for him the happier lives.
However, since his wife
Had ne'er caress'd him in her life,
He made complaint of it one night.
The entrance of a thief
Cut short his tale of grief,
And gave the lady such a fright,
She shrunk from dreaded harms
W...

Awm a young Yorksher lad as jolly an gay,
As a lark on a sunshiny mornin,
An Dolly's as fair as the flaars i' May,
An trubbles we meean to be scornin.
If we live wol to-morn aw shall make her mi wife,
An we'll donce to a rollickin measure,
For we booath are agreed to begin wedded life,
As we mean to goa throo it, wi pleasure.

Then we'll donce an be gay,
An we'll laff care away,
An we'll nivver sit broodin o'er sorrow,
An mi Dolly an me,
Ax yo all to a spree;
Come an donce at awr weddin to-morrow.

Awst be bashful awm sewer, aw wor ne'er wed befoor,
An aw feel rayther funny abaat it;
But Dolly aw guess can drag me aght o'th' mess,
An if ther's owt short we'll do baat it.
Mi mother says "Sol, if tha'll leave it to Doll,
Tha'll find shoo...

Long, long ago, with vows too much forgotten,
The Cross of Christ was seal'd on every brow,
Ah! slow of heart, that shun the Christian conflict;
Rise up at last! The accepted time is now.
Soldiers of Jesus! Blest who endure;
Stand in the battle; the victory is sure.

Hark! hark! the Saviour's voice to each is calling--
"I bore the Cross of Death in pain for thee;
On thee the Cross of daily life is falling:
Children! take up the Cross and follow Me."
Soldiers of Jesus! &c.

Strive as God's saints have striven in all ages;
Press those slow steps where firmer feet have trod:
For us their lives adorn the sacred pages,
For them a crown of glory is with God.
Soldiers of Jesus! &c.

Peace! peace! sweet voices bring an ancient story,
(Such ...

Though watery deserts hold apart
The worlds of East and West,
Still beats the selfsame human heart
In each proud Nation's breast.

Our floating turret tempts the main
And dares the howling blast
To clasp more close the golden chain
That long has bound them fast.

In vain the gales of ocean sweep,
In vain the billows roar
That chafe the wild and stormy steep
Of storied Elsinore.

She comes! She comes! her banners dip
In Neva's flashing tide,
With greetings on her cannon's lip,
The storm-god's iron bride!

Peace garlands with the olive-bough
Her thunder-bearing tower,
And plants before her cleaving prow
The sea-foam's milk-white flower.

No prairies heaped their garnered store
To fill her sunless hold,
Not r...

When I have borne in memory what has tamed
Great Nations, how ennobling thoughts depart
When men change swords for ledgers, and desert
The student’s bower for gold, some fears unnamed
I had, my Country!—am I to be blamed?
Now, when I think of thee, and what thou art,
Verily, in the bottom of my heart,
Of those unfilial fears I am ashamed.
For dearly must we prize thee; we who find
In thee a bulwark for the cause of men;
And I by my affection was beguiled:
What wonder if a Poet now and then,
Among the many movements of his mind,
Felt for thee as a lover or a child!

'The soul is its own witness and its own refuge'


Unto the deep the deep heart goes,
It lays its sadness nigh the breast:
Only the Mighty Mother knows
The wounds that quiver unconfessed.

It seeks a deeper silence still;
It folds itself around with peace,
Where thoughts alike of good or ill
In quietness unfostered cease.

It feels in the unwounding vast
For comfort for its hopes and fears:
The Mighty Mother bows at last;
She listens to her children's tears.

Where the last anguish deepens--there
The fire of beauty smites through pain:
A glory moves amid despair,
The Mother takes her child again.

IX

“My lips do need thy breath,
My lips do need thy smile,
And my pallid eyne, that light in thine
Which met the stars erewhile:
Yet go with light and life
If that thou lovest one
In all the earth who loveth thee
As truly as the sun.
Margret, Margret.”


XIV

“But better loveth he
Thy chaliced wine than thy chanted song,
And better both than thee,
Margret, Margret.”



XVII

“But better loveth she
Thy golden comb than thy gathered flowers,
And better both than thee,
Margret, Margret.”


XXII

“We brake no gold, a sign
Of stronger faith to be,
But I wear his last look in my soul,
Which said, I love but thee!”
Margret, Margret.


XXVI

A ...

Why has Spring one syllable less
Than any its fellow season?
There may be some other reason,
And I'm merely making a guess;
But surely it hoards such wealth
Of happiness, hope and health,
Sunshine and musical sound,
It may spare a foot from its name
Yet all the same
Superabound.

Soft-named Summer,
Most welcome comer,
Brings almost everything
Over which we dream or sing
Or sigh;
But then Summer wends its way,
To-morrow, - to-day, -
Good-bye!

Autumn, - the slow name lingers,
While we likewise flag;
It silences many singers;
Its slow days drag,
Yet hasten at speed
To leave us in chilly need
For Winter to strip indeed.

In all-lack Winter,
Dull of sense and of sound,
We huddle and shiver
...

Some are laughing, some are weeping;
She is sleeping, only sleeping.
Round her rest wild flowers are creeping;
There the wind is heaping, heaping
Sweetest sweets of Summer's keeping.
By the corn-fields ripe for reaping.

There are lilies, and there blushes
The deep rose, and there the thrushes
Sing till latest sunlight flushes
In the west; a fresh wind brushes
Through the leaves while evening hushes.

There by day the lark is singing
And the grass and weeds are springing;
There by night the bat is winging;
There for ever winds are bringing
Far-off chimes of church-bells ringing.

Night and morning, noon and even,
Their sound fills her dreams with Heaven:
The long strife at lent is striven:
Till her grave-bands shall be riven
...

One day Ambition, in his endless round,
All filled with vague and nameless longings, found
Slow wasting Genius, who from spot to spot
Went idly grazing, through the Realms of Thought.

Ambition cried, 'Come, wander forth with me;
I like thy face -but cannot stay with thee.'
'I will,' said Genius, 'for I needs must own
I'm getting dull by being much alone.'

'Your hands are cold -come, warm them at my fire,'
Ambition said.    'Now, what is thy desire?'
Quoth Genius, ''Neath the sod of yonder heather
Lie gems untold.    Let's plough them out together.'

They bent like strong young oxen to the plough,
This done, Ambition questioned, 'Whither now?
We'll leave these gems for all the world to see!
New sports and pleasures wait for thee and me.'

...