When in her way she meets them they appear Peculiar people-death has made them dear. He nam'd his friend, but then his hand she prest, And fondly whisper'd "Thou must go to rest;" "I go," he said; but, as he spoke, she found His hand more cold, and fluttering was the sound! Then gaz'd affrighten'd; but she caught a last, A dying look of love, and all was past:
She plac'd a decent stone his grave above, Neatly engrav'd-an offering of her love; For that she wrought, for that forsook her bed, Awake alike to duty and the dead;
She would have griev'd, had friends presum'd to spare
The least assistance-'twas her proper care.
Here will she come, and on the grave will sit, Folding her arms, in long abstracted fit; But, if observer pass, will take her round, And careless seem, for she would not be found; Then go again, and thus her hour employ, While visions please her, and while woes destroy.
Forbear, sweet maid! nor be by fancy led, To hold mysterious converse with the dead; For sure at length thy thoughts, thy spirit's pain, In this sad conflict, will disturb thy brain; All have their tasks and trials; thine are hard, But short the time, and glorious the reward; Thy patient spirit to thy duties give, Regard the dead, but to the living live.
NEAR YONDER COPSE, where once the garden smiled, And still where many a garden flower grows wild; There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose, The village preacher's modest mansion rose. A man he was to all the country dear, And passing rich with forty pounds a year; Remote from towns he ran his godly race,
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change his place. Unskilful he to fawn, or seek for power, By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour; Far other aims his heart had learned to prize, More bent to raise the wretched than to rise. His house was known to all the vagrant train, He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain The long-remembered beggar was his guest, Whose beard descending swept his aged breast ; The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,
Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed; The broken soldier, kindly bid to stay,
Sat by his fire, and talked the night away:
Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done,
Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields were won. Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow, And quite forgot their vices in their woe; Careless their merits or their faults to scan, His pity gave ere charity began.
Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride, And even his failings leaned to virtue's side; But in his duty prompt at every call,
He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all. And, as a bird each fond endearment tries, To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies, He tried each art, reproved each dull delay, Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.
Beside the bed where parting life was laid, And sorrow, guilt, and pain, by turns dismayed, The reverend champion stood. At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul; Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise, And his last faltering accents whispered praise.
At church, with meek and unaffected grace, His looks adorned the venerable place; Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway, And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray. The service past, around the pious man, With ready zeal, each honest rustic ran; Even children followed with endearing wile,
And pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile. His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed,
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distressed; To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given, But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.
As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form,
Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm, Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
SHELLEY chose the measure of this poem with great felicity. The earnest hurry of the four short lines, followed by the long effusiveness of the Alexandrine, expresses the eagerness and continuity of the song of the lark.-Leigh Hunt.
HAIL to thee, blithe spirit!
Bird thou never wert, That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.
Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest, Like a cloud of fire!
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing, still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.
In the golden lightning
Of the sunken sun,
O'er which clouds are brightening,
Thou dost float and run,
Like an embodied joy, whose race is just begun.
The pale purple even
Melts around thy flight;
Like a star of heaven
In the broad daylight,
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight,
Keen as are the arrows Of that silver sphere,
Whose intense lamp narrows
In the white dawn clear,
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there,
All the earth and air With thy voice is loud, As, when night is bare From one lonely cloud,
The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed.
What thou art, we know not;
What is most like thee?
From rainbow clouds there flow not
Drops so bright to see,
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.
Like a poet hidden
In the light of thought, Singing hymns unbidden,
Till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not.
Like a high-born maiden
In a palace tower, Soothing her love-laden
Soul in secret hour
With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower.
Like a glow-worm golden
In a dell of dew,
Scattering unbeholden
Its aërial hue
Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the view.
Like a rose embowered
In its own green leaves,
By warm winds deflowered,
Till the scent it gives
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-winged thieves.
Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass, Rain-awakened flowers, All that ever was
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass.
Teach me, sprite or bird,
What sweet thoughts are thine:
I have never heard
Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.
Chorus hymeneal,
Or triumphal chant,
Matched with thine would be all
But an empty vaunt
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want.
What objects are the fountains
Of thy happy strain?
What fields, or waves, or mountains?
What shapes of sky or plain?
What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?
With thy clear keen joyance Langour cannot be:
Shadow of annoyance
Never came near thee:
Thou lovest; but ne'er knew love's sad satiety.
Waking or asleep,
Thou of death must deem Things more true and deep
Than we mortals dream,
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?
We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
Yet if we could scorn
Hate, and pride, and fear;
If we were things born
Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.
Better than all measures Of delightful sound, Better than all treasures
That in books are found,
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!
Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know, Such harmonious madness From my lips would flow,
The world should listen then, as I am listening now.
HOPE TRIUMPHANT IN DEATH.
UNFADING HOPE! when life's last embers burn- When soul to soul, and dust to dust return, Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour! Oh! then thy kingdom comes, Immortal Power! What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye! Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey The morning dream of life's eternal day— Then, then the triumph and the trance begin, And all the Phoenix spirit burns within?
Oh, deep-enchanting prelude to repose, The dawn of bliss, the twilight of our woes! Yet half I hear the parting spirit sigh, It is a dread and awful thing to die! Mysterious worlds, untravell'd by the sun! Where time's far-wandering tide has never run, From your unfathom'd shades and viewless spheres, A warning comes, unheard by other ears.
'Tis Heaven's commanding trumpet, long and loud, Like Sinai's thunder, pealing from the cloud! While Nature hears, with terror-mingled trust The shock that hurls her fabric to the dust; With mortal terrors clouds immortal bliss, And shrieks and hovers o'er the dark abyss!
Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb! Melt and dispel, ye spectre-doubts that roll Cimmerian darkness on the parting soul! Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay, Chased, on his night-steed, by the star of day! The strife is o'er-the pangs of Nature close, And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes. Hark! as the spirit eyes, with eagle gaze, The noon of Heaven, undazzled by the blaze, On heavenly winds, that waft her to the sky,
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