THE FOREST SANCTUARY. I. THE Voices of my home!-I hear them still! night The blessed household voices, wont to fill My heart's clear depths with unalloy'd delight! earth Are music parted, and the tones of mirth-- Wild, silvery tones, that rang through days more bright! Have died in others,-yet to me they come, Singing of boyhood back-the voices of my home! II. They call me through this hush of woods, reposing In the grey stillness of the summer morn, They wander by when heavy flowers are closing, And thoughts grow deep, and winds and stars are born; E'en as a fount's remember'd gushings burst worn By quenchless longings, to my soul I say Oh! for the dove's swift wings, that I might flee away, III. And find mine ark !—yet whither?—I must bear A yearning heart within me to the grave. I am of those o'er whom a breath of air Just darkening in its course the lake's bright wave, And sighing through the feathery canes 1-hath power To call up shadows, in the silent hour, From the dim past, as from a wizard's cave! So must it be!-These skies above me spread, Are they my own soft skies?-Ye rest not here, my dead! IV. Ye far amidst the southern flowers lie sleeping, ear; But the faint echoes in my breast that dwell, And for their birth-place moan, as moans the oceanshell.2 V. Peace! I will dash these fond regrets to earth, And lineage, and once home,-my native Spain ! VI. A blighted name!—I hear the winds of morn- What part hath mortal name, where God alone Speaks to the mighty waste, and through its heart is known? VII. Is it not much that I may worship Him, With nought my spirit's breathings to control, And feel His presence in the vast, and dim, And whispery woods, where dying thunders roll From the far cataracts ?-Shall I not rejoice That I have learn'd at last to know His voice From man's?—I will rejoice !—my soaring soul Now hath redeem'd her birth-right of the day, And won, through clouds, to Him, her own unfetter'd way! VIII. And thou, my boy! that silent at my knee Pure through its depths, a thing without disguise Is it not much that I may guide thy prayer, And circle thy glad soul with free and healthful air? IX. Why should I weep on thy bright head, my boy? Within thy fathers' halls thou wilt not dwell, Nor lift their banner, with a warrior's joy, Amidst the sons of mountain chiefs, who fell For Spain of old.-Yet what if rolling waves Have borne us far from our ancestral graves! Thou shalt not feel thy bursting heart rebel As mine hath done; nor bear what I have borne, Casting in falsehood's mould th' indignant brow of scorn. |