ÀҾ˹éÒ˹ѧÊ×Í
PDF
ePub
[graphic][subsumed]
[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small]

No where by thee my steps shall be, For ever and for ever.

But here will sigh thine alder tree,
And here thine aspen shiver;
And here by thee will hum the bee,
For ever and for ever.

A thousand suns will stream on thee,
A thousand moons will quiver:
But not by thee my steps shall be,
For ever and for ever.

THE BEGGAR MAID.

HER arms across her breast she laid; She was more fair than words can say:

Bare-footed came the beggar maid
Before the king Cophetua.

In robe and crown the king stept down,

To meet and greet her on her way; "It is no wonder," said the lords,

"She is more beautiful than day." As shines the moon in clouded skies, She in her poor attire was seen: One praised her ankles, one her eyes, One her dark hair and lovesome mien.

So sweet a face, such angel grace,
In all that land had never been:
Cophetua sware a royal oath:

This beggar maid shall be my
queen!"

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

Low voluptuous music winding trembled,

Wov'n in circles: they that heard it sigh'd,

Panted hand in hand with faces pale, Swung themselves, and in low tones replied;

Till the fountain spouted, showering wide

Sleet of diamond-drift and pearly hail; Then the music touch'd the gates and died;

Rose again from where it seem'd to fail,

Storm'd in orbs of song, a growing gale;

Till thronging in and in, to where they waited,

As 'twere a hundred-throated nightingale,

The strong tempestuous treblo throbb'd and palpitated:

Ran into its giddiest whirl of sound, Caught the sparkles, and in circles,” Purple gauzes, golden hazes, liquid

[blocks in formation]

And then I look'd up toward a mountain-tract,

That girt the region with high cliff and lawn:

I saw that every morning, far withdrawn

Beyond the darkness and the cataract, God made himself an awful rose of dawn,

Unheeded and detaching, fold by fold,

From those still heights, and, slowly drawing near,

A vapor heavy, hueless, formless, cold,

Came floating on for many a month and year,

Unheeded and I thought I would have spoken,

And warn'd that madman ere it grew too late:

But, as in dreams, I could not. Mine was broken.

When that cold vapor touch'd the palace gate,

And link'd again. I saw within my head

A gray and gap-tooth'd man as lean as death,

Who slowly rode across a wither'd heath,

And lighted at a ruin'd inn, and said:

IV.

"Wrinkled ostler, grim and thin!
Here is custom come your way;
Take my brute, and lead him in,
Stuff his ribs with mouldy hay.
"Bitter barmaid, waning fast!

See that shee.s are on my bed;
What! the flower of life is past:
It is long before you wed."
"Slip-shod waiter, lank and sour,
At the Dragon on the heath!
Let us have a quiet hour,

Let us hob-and-nob with Death,
"I am old, but let me drink ;
Bring me spices, bring me wine
I remember, when I think,

That my youth was half divine.
"Wine is good for shrivell'd lips,
When a blanket wraps the day,
When the rott n woodland drips,

And the leaf is stamp'd in clay,
"Sit thee down, and have no shame,
Check by jowl, and knee by knee;"
What care I for any name?

What for order or degree?
"Let me screw thee up a peg:

Let me loose thy tongue with wine: Callest thou that thing a leg?

Which is thinnest ? thine or mine?
"Thou shalt not be saved by works;
Thou hast been a sinner too;
Ruin'd trunks on wither'd forks,
Empty scarecrows, I and you !
Fill the cup, and fill the can :
Have a rouse before the morn;
Every moment dies a man,

Every moment one is born.
"We are men of ruin'd blood;
Therefore comes it we are wise.
Fish are we that love the mud,
Rising to no fancy-ilies.

"Name and fame! to fly sublime Thro' the courts, the camps, the schools,

Is to be the ball of Time,

Bandied by the hands of fools.
"Friendship!-to be two in one-
Let the canting liar pack!
Well I know, when I am gone,

How she mouths behind my back.
"Virtue!-to be good and just-
Every heart, when sifted well,
Is a clot of warmer dust,

Mix'd with cunning sparks of hell.
"Oh! we two as well can look
Whited thought and cleanly life
As the priest, above his book
Leering at his neighbor's wife.

"Fill the cup, and fill the can:
Have a rouse before the morn;
Every moment dies a man,

Every moment one is born.
"Drink, and let the parties rave:
They are fill'd with idle spleen;
Rising, falling, like a wave,

For they know not what they mean "He that roars for liberty

Faster binds a tyrant's power;
And the tyrant's cruel glee
Forces on the freer hour.
"Fill the can, and fill the cup;
All the windy ways of men
Are but dust that rises up,
And is lightly laid again.
"Greet her with applausive breath,
Freedom, gaily doth she tread;
In her right a civic wreath,
In her left a human head.

"No, I love not what is new

She is of an ancient house: And I think we know the huo

Of that cap upon her brows. "Let her go! her thirst she slakes Where the bloody conduit runs: Then her sweetest meal she makes On the first-born of her sons. "Drink to lofty hopes that coolVisions of a perfect State: Drink we, last, the public fool, Frantic love and frantic hate. "('hant me now some wicked stave, Till thy drooping courage rise, And the glow-worm of the grave Glimmer in thy rheumy eyes. "Fear not thou to loose thy tongue; Set thy hoary fancies free; What is loathsome to the young Savors well to thee and me. "Change, reverting to the years, When thy nerves could understand What there is in loving tears,

And the warmth of hand in hand.
"Tell me tales of thy first love—
April hopes, the fools of chance;
Till the graves begin to move,

And the dead begin to dance.
"Fill the can, and fill the cup:
All the windy ways of men
Are but dust that rises up,
And is lightly laid again.
"Trooping from their mouldy dens
The chap-fallen circle spreads:
Welcome, fellow-citizens,

Hollow hearts and empty heads !
"You are bones, and what of that?
Every face, however full,
Padded round with flesh and fat,
Is but modell'd on a skull.

"Death is king, and Vivat Rex!

Tread a measure on the stones,

ODE.-INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION.

Madam-if I know your sex,

From the fashion of your bones, "No, I cannot praise the fire

In your eye-nor yet your lip: All the more do I admire

Joints of cunning workmanship. "Lo! God's likeness the ground

plan

Neither modell'd, glazed, or framed: Buss me, thou rough sketch of man, Far too naked to be shamed! "Drink to Fortune, drink to Chance, While we keep a little breath! Drink to heavy Ignorance!

Hob-and-nob with brother Death! "Thou art mazed, the night is long, And the longer night is near: What! I am not all as wrong As a bitter jest is dear. "Youthful hopes, by scores, to all. When the locks are crisp and curl'd; Unto me my maudlin gall

And my mockeries of the world. "Fill the cup, and fill the can! Mingle madness, mingle georn! Dregs of life, and lees of man:

Yet we will not die forlorn!"

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

To trample round my fallen head,

83

And Vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst not save.

There let the wind sweep and the plover cry:

But thou, go by.

Child, if it were thine error or thy crime

I care no longer, being all unblest: Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time,

And I desire to rest.

Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I lie: Go by, go by.

THE EAGLE

FRAGMENT.

IIE clasps the crag with hooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.
The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls;
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

Move eastward, happy earth, and leavo Yon orange sunset waning slow: From fringes of the faded eye,

O, happy planet, eastward go;

Till over thy dark shoulder glow
Thy silver sister-world, and riso
To glass herself in dewy eyes
That watch me from the glen below.
Ah, bear me with thee, smoothly borne,
Dip forward under starry light,
And move me to my marriage-morn,
And round again to happy night.

INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION. UPLIFT a thousand voices full and sweet, In this wide hall with earth's invention stored,

And praise th' invisible universal Lord, Who lets once more in peace the nations meet,

Where Science, Art, and Labor have outpour'd

Their myriad horns of plenty at our feet.

O silent father of our Kings to be
Mourn'd in this golden hour of jubilee,
For this, for all, we weep our thanks to
thee!

The world-compelling plan was thine,
And lo! the long laborious miles,
Of Palace: lo! the giant aisles,
Rich in model and design:
Harvest-tool and husbandry,
Loom and wheel and engin'ry,
Secrets of the sullen mine,

Steel and gold, and corn and wine,
Fabric rough, or Fairy fine,
Sunny tokens of the Line,

« ¡è͹˹éÒ´Óà¹Ô¹¡ÒõèÍ
 »