Imatges de pàgina
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

And O, her beauty was fair to see,
But still and steadfast was her e'e!
Such beauty bard may never declare,
For there was no pride nor passion there;
And the soft desire of maiden's een
In that mild face could never be seen.
Her seymar was the lily flower,
And her cheek the moss-rose in the shower,
And her voice like the distant melodye,
That floats along the twilight sea.
But she loved to raike the lanely glen,
And keeped afar frae the haunts of

men;

Her holy hymns unheard to sing,
To suck the flowers, and drink the spring.
But wherever her peaceful form appeared,
The wild beasts of the hill were cheered;
The wolf played blithely round the field,
The lordly bison lowed and kneeled;
The

And cowered aneath her lily hand.
And when at even the woodlands rung,
When hymns of other worlds she sung
In ecstasy of sweet devotion,
0, then the glen was all in motion!
The wild beasts of the forest came,
Broke from their bughts and faulds the

tame,

And goved around, charmed and amazed; Even the dull cattle crooned and gazed, And murmured, and looked with anxious

pain

For Something the mystery to explain.
The buzzard
came with the throstle-cock;
The Corby left her houf in the rock;
The blackbird alang wi' the eagle flew;
The hind
came tripping o'er the dew;
Wolf and the kid their raike began,

The

And the tod, and the lamb, and the

leveret ran;

123

The hawk and the hern attour them hung, And the merl and the mavis forhooyed their young;

And all in a peaceful ring were hurled ;— It was like an eve in a sinless world!

When a month and a day had come and

gane,

Kilmeny sought the green-wood wene;

There laid her down on the leaves sae green,

And Kilmeny on earth was never mair

seen.

But O, the words that fell from her

mouth

Were words of wonder, and words of

truth!

[blocks in formation]

FLY TO THE DESERT.

FLY to the desert, fly with me,

Our Arab tents are rude for thee;

But, O, the choice what heart can doubt,

Of tents with love, or thrones without?
Our rocks are rough, but smiling there
The acacia waves her yellow hair,
Lonely and sweet, nor loved the less
For flowering in a wilderness.
Our sands are bare, but down their slope

As gracefully and gayly springs
As o'er the marble courts of kings.

The silvery-footed antelope

Then come,thy Arab maid will be
The loved and lone acacia-tree,

The antelope, whose feet shall bless
With their light sound thy loveliness.

O, there are looks and tones that dart
An instant sunshine through the heart,
As if the soul that minute caught

Some treasure it through life had sought;

As if the very lips and eyes
Predestined to have all our sighs,
And never be forgot again,
Sparkled and spoke before us then!

So came thy every glance and tone, When first on me they breathed and shone;

New as if brought from other spheres,
Yet welcome as if loved for years.

THE MID HOUR OF NIGHT.

AT the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, I fly

To the lone vale we loved, when life shone warm in thine eye;

And I think oft, if spirits can steal from the regions of air,

To revisit past scenes of delight, thou wilt come to me there,

And tell me our love is remembered even in the sky!

Then I sing the wild song 't was once

such pleasure to hear,

When our voices, commingling, breathed like one on the ear;

And, as Echo far off through the vale my sad orison rolls,

I think, O my love! 't is thy voice, from the Kingdom of Souls, Faintly answering still the notes that

once were so dear.

[blocks in formation]

'T was that friends, the beloved of my bosom, were near,

Who made every dear scene of enchantment more dear,

And who felt how the best charms of nature improve,

When we see them reflected from looks that we love.

Sweet Vale of Avoca! how calm could I rest

In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best;

Where the storms that we feel in this cold world should cease, And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in peace.

O THOU WHO DRY'ST THE MOURN-
ER'S TEAR.

O THOU who dry'st the mourner's tear!
How dark this world would be,
If, when deceived and wounded here,
We could not fly to thee.
The friends who in our sunshine live,
When winter comes, are flown;
And he who has but tears to give

Must weep those tears alone.
But thou wilt heal that broken heart
Which, like the plants that throw
Their fragrance from the wounded part,
Breathes sweetness out of woe.

When joy no longer soothes or cheers,
And e'en the hope that threw
A moment's sparkle o'er our tears
Is dimmed and vanished too,

O, who would bear life's stormy doom,
Did not thy wing of love

Come, brightly wafting through the gloom
Our peace-branch from above?
Then sorrow, touched by thee, grows
bright

With more than rapture's ray;
As darkness shows us worlds of light
We never saw by day!

THOU ART, O GOD!

THOU art, O God! the life and light
Of all this wondrous world we see;
Its glow by day, its smile by night,
Are but reflections caught from thee.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

THE LAKE OF GENEVA.

CLEAR, placid Leman! thy contrasted lake,

With the wild world I dwelt in, is a thing

Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake

Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring.

This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing To waft me from distraction; once I loved

Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring

Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved,

That I with stern delights should e'er have been so moved.

It is the hush of night, and all between Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,

Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctly

[blocks in formation]

On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds,
With a diadem of snow.

Around his waist are forests braced,
The avalanche in his hand;
But ere it fall, that thundering ball
Must pause for my command.

The glacier's cold and restless mass
Moves onward day by day;
But I am he who bids it pass,

Or with its ice delay.

I am the spirit of the place,

Could make the mountain bow And quiver to his caverned base, And what with me wouldst Thou?

THE IMMORTAL MIND.

WHEN coldness wraps this suffering clay, Ah, whither strays the immortal mind? It cannot die, it cannot stay,

But leaves its darkened dust behind. Then, unembodied, doth it trace

By steps each planet's heavenly way? Or fill at once the realms of space, A thing of eyes, that all survey?

Eternal, boundless, undecayed,

A thought unseen, but seeing all, All, all in earth or skies displayed,

Shall it survey, shall it recall : Each fainter trace that memory holds So darkly of departed years, In one broad glance the soul beholds, And all that was at once appears.

Before creation peopled earth,

Its eyes shall roll through chaos back; And where the farthest heaven had birth, The spirit trace its rising track. And where the future mars or makes,

Its glance dilate o'er all to be, While sun is quenched or system breaks, Fixed in its own eternity.

Above or love, hope, hate, or fear,

It lives all passionless and pure: An age shall fleet like earthly year; Its years as moments shall endure. Away, away, without a wing,

O'er all, through all, its thoughts shall
fly,-

A nameless and eternal thing,
Forgetting what it was to die.

« AnteriorContinua »