That is solemn we have ended, --
Be it but a play,
Or a glee among the garrets,
Or a holiday,

Or a leaving home; or later,
Parting with a world
We have understood, for better
Still it be unfurled.

Tyrant of all our loves and friendships here,
Behold thy beauteous victim! - Ah! tis thine
To rend fond hearts, and start the tend'rest tear
Where joy should long in cloudless radiance shine.

Alas! the mourning Muse in vain would paint,
Blest shade! how purely pass'd thy life away,
Or, with the meekness of a favour'd saint,
How rose thy spirit to the realms of day.

'Twas thine to fill each part that gladdens life,
Such as approving angels smile upon; -
The faultless daughter, parent, friend, and wife, -
Virtues short-lived! they set just as they shone.

Thus, in the bosom of some winding grove,
Where oft the pensive melodist retires,
From his sweet instrument, the note of love,
Charms the rapt ear, but, as it charms, expires.

Farewell, p...

And what is Life? An hour-glass on the run,
A mist retreating from the morning sun,
A busy, bustling, still repeated dream;
Its length?--A minute's pause, a moment's thought;
And happiness?--a bubble on the stream,
That in the act of seizing shrinks to nought.

What are vain hopes?--The puffing gale of morn,
That of its charms divests the dewy lawn,
And robs each flow'ret of its gem,--and dies;
A cobweb hiding disappointment's thorn,
Which stings more keenly through the thin disguise.

And what is Death? Is still the cause unfound?
That dark, mysterious name of horrid sound?--
A long and lingering sleep, the weary crave.
And Peace? where can its happiness abound?
No where at all, save heaven, and the grave.
Then what is Life?--When stripp'd of its di...

Part IV

Late Autumn

They who die young are blest. -
    Should we not envy such?
They are Earth's happiest,
    God-loved and favored much! -
They who die young are blest.


1

Sick and sad, propped among pillows, she sits at her window.

'Though the dog-tooth violet come
With April showers,
And the wild-bees' music hum
About the flowers,
We shall never wend as when
Love laughed leading us from men
Over violet vale and glen,
Where the bob-white piped for hours,
And we heard the rain-crow's drum.

Now November heavens are gray;
Autumn kills
Every joy - like leaves of May
In the rills. -
Still I sit and lean and listen
To a voice that has arisen
In my heart - with eyes tha...

Quel sol che mi mostrava il cammin destro.

LOVE AND HE SEEK LAURA, BUT FIND NO TRACES OF HER EXCEPT IN THE SKY.


    That sun, which ever signall'd the right road,
Where flash'd her own bright feet, to heaven to fly,
Returning to the Eternal Sun on high,
Has quench'd my light, and cast her earthly load;
Thus, lone and weary, my oft steps have trode,
As some wild animal, the sere woods by,
Fleeing with heavy heart and downcast eye
The world which since to me a blank has show'd.
Still with fond search each well-known spot I pace
Where once I saw her: Love, who grieves me so,
My only guide, directs me where to go.
I find her not: her every sainted trace
Seeks, in bright realms above, her parent star
From grisly Styx and black Avernus far.
...

    It was the morning; through the shutters closed,
    Along the balcony, the earliest rays
    Of sunlight my dark room were entering;
    When, at the time that sleep upon our eyes
    Its softest and most grateful shadows casts,
    There stood beside me, looking in my face,
    The image dear of her, who taught me first
    To love, then left me to lament her loss.
    To me she seemed not dead, but sad, with such
    A countenance as the unhappy wear.
    Her right hand near my head she sighing placed;
    "Dost thou still live," she said to me, "and dost
    Thou still remember what we were and are?"
    And I replied: "Whence comest thou, and how,
    Beloved and beautiful? Oh how, how I
    Have grieved, still grieve for thee! Nor did I think
...

Who weeps for strangers? Many wept
For George and Sarah Green;
Wept for that pair's unhappy fate,
Whose grave may here be seen.

By night, upon these stormy fells,
Did wife and husband roam;
Six little ones at home had left,
And could not find that home.

For 'any' dwelling-place of man
As vainly did they seek.
He perish'd; and a voice was heard
The widow's lonely shriek.

Not many steps, and she was left
A body without life
A few short steps were the chain that bound
The husband to the wife.

Now do those sternly-featured hills
Look gently on this grave;
And quiet now are the depths of air,
As a sea without a wave.

But deeper lies the heart of peace
In quiet more profound;
The heart of quietness is here<...

    Must I needes write, who's hee that can refuse,
He wants a minde, for her that hath no Muse,
The thought of her doth heau'nly rage inspire,
Next powerfull, to those clouen tongues of fire.
    Since I knew ought time neuer did allowe
Me stuffe fit for an Elegie, till now;
When France and England's HENRIES dy'd, my quill,
Why, I know not, but it that time lay still.
'Tis more then greatnesse that my spirit must raise,
To obserue custome I vse not to praise;
Nor the least thought of mine yet ere depended,
On any one from whom she was descended;
That for their fauour I this way should wooe,
As some poor wretched things (perhaps) may doe;
I gaine the end, whereat I onely ayme,
If by my freedome, I may giue her fame.
    Walking then forth being newly vp from b...

    Time, when thou shalt bring again
    Pallas from the Trojan plain,
    Portia from the Roman's hall,
    Brynhild from the fiery wall,
    Eleanor, whose fearless breath
    Drew the venom'd fangs of Death,
    And Philippa doubly brave
    Or to conquer or to save--

    When thou shalt on one bestow
    All their grace and all their glow,
    All their strength and all their state,
    All their passion pure and great,
    Some far age may honour then
    Such another queen of men.

I know!    I know!--
The ceaseless ache, the emptiness, the woe,--
The pang of loss,--
The strength that sinks beneath so sore a cross.
"--Heedless and careless, still the world wags on,
And leaves me broken ...    Oh, my son!    my son!"

Yet--think of this!--
Yea, rather think on this!--
He died as few men get the chance to die,--
Fighting to save a world's morality.
He died the noblest death a man may die,
Fighting for God, and Right, and Liberty;--
And such a death is Immortality.

"He died unnoticed in the muddy trench."
Nay,--God was with him, and he did not blench;
Filled him with holy fires that nought could quench,
And when He saw his work below was done,
He gently called to him,--"My son!    My son!
I need thee for a...

O'er the wide heath now moon-tide horrors hung,
And night's dark pencil dimm'd the tints of spring;
The boding minstrel now harsh omens sung,
And the bat spread his dark nocturnal wing.

At that still hour, pale Cynthia oft had seen
The fair Eliza (joyous once and gay),
With pensive step, and melancholy mien,
O'er the broad plain in love-born anguish stray.

Long had her heart with Henry's been entwined,
And love's soft voice had waked the sacred blaze
Of Hymen's altar; while, with him combined,
His cherub train prepared the torch to raise:

When, lo! his standard raging war uprear'd,
And honour call'd her Henry from her charms.
He fought, but ah! torn, mangled, blood-besmear'd,
Fell, nobly fell, amid his conquering arms!

In her sad bosom,...

Perhaps if Death is kind, and there can be returning,
We will come back to earth some fragrant night,
And take these lanes to find the sea, and bending
Breathe the same honeysuckle, low and white.

We will come down at night to these resounding beaches
And the long gentle thunder of the sea,
Here for a single hour in the wide starlight
We shall be happy, for the dead are free.

Our nights have cruel eyes
And have cast us about too thinly,
Fallen upon us,
Divested the attention of the wind.

Night comes to develop us,
Will polish our minds with
A precision lasting 'til daybreak.
Its damp coolness peaks with wretched effect.

Autumnal decay
Whereby the slow process of vegetation
Displeases the nostril,
Is but a preamble to greater violence
Leading tepid legislation in an orchestra
Toward greater effect.

The thin harmony of our lives
Positions no alarms whereby
We might use them.

The fabric mixture of existence, nothing but investiture,
Props to heighten necessary lies,
Strains at extinction,
The volcanic instrument life itself.

Goals are these same vehicles
To operate weak desir...

There's little joy in life for me,
And little terror in the grave;
I 've lived the parting hour to see
Of one I would have died to save.

Calmly to watch the failing breath,
Wishing each sigh might be the last;
Longing to see the shade of death
O'er those belovèd features cast.

The cloud, the stillness that must part
The darling of my life from me;
And then to thank God from my heart,
To thank Him well and fervently;

Although I knew that we had lost
The hope and glory of our life;
And now, benighted, tempest-tossed,
Must bear alone the weary strife.

I

How shall the burial rite be read?
The solemn song be sung?
The requiem for the loveliest dead,
That ever died so young?


II

Her friends are gazing on her,
And on her gaudy bier,
And weep! oh! to dishonor
Dead beauty with a tear!


III

They loved her for her wealth
And they hated her for her pride
But she grew in feeble health,
And they love her that she died.


IV

They tell me (while they speak
Of her "costly broider'd pall")
That my voice is growing weak
That I should not sing at all


V

Or that my tone should be
Tun'd to such solemn song
So mournfully so mournfully,
That the dead may feel no wrong.


VI

But she is gone a...

    The old year is dying,
    Its last hour is hieing
        Over the verge;
    The night winds are plying,
    And are mournfully sighing
        Its funeral dirge.

    And now, in its even,
    While its spirit is riven
        Through the bright zone,
    Beyond the heaven
    To whence it was given -
        To the unknown.

    Its sadness in ending
    Like a cloud is descending
        Over my soul,
    And the thoughts that are pending
    With the low winds are blending,
        Helping their dole.

    A year of existence
    Has passed to the distance
        Ne'er to return:
    To the right was resistance,
    From duty desistance,
        Nor would I learn.

    But duty neglected

As roam'd a pilgrim o'er the mountain drear,
    On whose lone verge the foaming billows roar;
The wail of hopeless sorrow pierc'd his ear,
    And swell'd at distance on the sounding shore.

The mourner breath'd her deep complaint to night,
    Her moan she mingled with the rapid blast;
That bar'd her bosom in its wasting flight,
    And o'er the earth her scatter'd tresses cast!

"Ye winds, she cried, still heave the lab'ring deep,
    "The mountain shake, the howling forest rend;
"Still dash the shiv'ring fragment from the steep,
    "Nor for a wretch like me the storm suspend.

"Ah, wherefore wish the rising storm to spare?
    "Ah, why implore the raging winds to save?
"What refuge can the breast where lives despair
    "Desire but death? what s...

Died at Hartford, October 23d, 1861, aged 20.


                    How beautiful in death
The young and lovely sleeper lies--
Sweet calmness on the close-sealed eyes,
Flowers o'er the snowy neck and brow
Where lustrous curls profusely flow;
If 'twere not for the icy chill
That from her marble hand doth thrill,
And for her lip that gives no sound,
And for the weeping all around,
                    How beautiful were death.

                    How beautiful in life!
Her pure affections heavenward moving,
Her guileless heart so full of loving,
Her joyous smile, her form of grace,
Her clear mind lighting up the face,
And making home a blessed place,
Still breathing thro' the parents' heart
A gladness words could ne'er impart,
A fai...