Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB
[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

The snow recommences;

The buried fences

Mark no longer

The road o'er the plain;

While through the meadows,

Like fearful shadows,

Slowly passes

A funeral train.

The bell is pealing,
And every feeling
Within me responds

To the dismal knell;

Shadows are trailing,
My heart is bewailing
And tolling within

Like a funeral bell.

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

The ungrateful world

Has, it seems, dealt harshly with thee,

Since, beneath the skies of Denmark, First I met thee.

There are marks of age,

There are thumb-marks on thy margin,

Made by hands that clasped thee rudely.
At the alehouse.

Soiled and dull thou art;

Yellow are thy time-worn pages,

As the russet, rain-molested

Leaves of autumn.

Thou art stained with wine

Scattered from hilarious goblets,

As these leaves with the libations
Of Olympus.

Yet dost thou recall

Days departed, half-forgotten,

When in dreamy youth I wandered
By the Baltic,--

When I paused to hear

The old ballad of King Christian

Shouted from suburban taverns

In the twilight.

Thou recallest bards,

Who, in solitary chambers,

And with hearts by passion wasted,

Wrote thy pages.

Thou recallest homes

Where thy songs of love and friendship

Made the gloomy Northern winter

Bright as summer.

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

TO AN OLD DANISH SONG BOOK.

Once in Elsinore,

At the court of old King Hamlet,
Yorick and his boon companions
Sang these ditties.

Once Prince Frederick's Guard

Sang them in their smoky barracks;

Suddenly the English cannon
Joined the chorus!

Peasants in the field,

Sailors on the roaring ocean,

Students, tradesmen, pale mechanics,

All have sung them.

Thou hast been their friend;

They, alas! have left thee friendless!
Yet at least by one warm fireside
Art thou welcome.

And, as swallows build

In these wide, old-fashioned chimneys,
So thy twittering songs shall nestle
In my bosom,—

Quiet, close, and warm,

Sheltered from all molestation,

And recalling by their voices
Youth and travel.

« AnteriorContinuar »