The Household Book of Poetry

From each cave and rocky fastness

In its vastness,

Floats some fragment of a song:

From the far-off isles enchanted
Heaven has planted

With the golden fruit of truth;

From the flashing surf, whose vision

Gleams elysian

In the tropic clime of Youth;

From the strong will, and the endeavor
That for ever

Wrestles with the tides of fate;
From the wreck of hopes far-scattered,
Tempest-shattered,

Floating waste and desolate ;—

Ever drifting, drifting, drifting

On the shifting

Currents of the restless heart;
Till at length in books recorded,

They, like hoarded

Household words, no more depart.

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

Hearts there are on the sounding shore, Something whispers soft to me, Restless and roaming for evermore.

Like this weary weed of the sea; Bear they yet on each beating breast The eternal type of the wondrous whole Growth unfolding amidst unrest, Grace informing with silent soul.

CORNELIUS GEORGE FENNER

THE SEA-IN CALM.

Look what immortal floods the sunset pours Upon us-Mark! how still (as though in dreams

Bound) the once wild and terrible ocean seems!

How silent are the winds! no billow roars;
But all is tranquil as Elysian shores.
The silver margin which aye runneth round
The moon-enchanted sea, hath here no sound;
Even Echo speaks not on these radiant moors'
What is the giant of the ocean dead,
Whose strength was all unmatched beneat
the sun?

No: he reposes! Now his toils are done;
More quiet than the babbling brooks is he.
So mightiest powers by deepest calms are fed,
And sleep, how oft, in things that gentlest be'
BARRY CORNWALL

GULF-WEED.

A WEARY Weed, tossed to and fro,
Drearily drenched in the ocean brine,
Soaring high and sinking low,

Lashed along without will of mine;
Sport of the spoom of the surging sea;
Flung on the foam, afar and anear,
Mark my manifold mystery,-

Growth and grace in their place appear.

I bear round berries, gray and red,
Rootless and rover though I be;

My spangled leaves, when nicely spread,
Arboresce as a trunkless tree;

Corals curious coat me o'er,

White and hard in apt array; 'Mid the wild waves' rude uproar, Gracefully grow I, night and day.

THE LITTLE BEACH-BIRD.

THOU little bird, thou dweller by the sea,
Why takest thou its melancholy voice,
And with that boding cry
O'er the waves dost thou fly?

Oh! rather, bird, with me

Through the fair land rejoice!

II.

Thy flitting form comes ghostly dim and pale As driven by a beating storm at sea;

Thy cry is weak and scared,

As if thy mates had shared The doom of us. Thy wailWhat does it bring to me?

III.

HAMPTON BEACH.

There, with its waving blade of green,

Thou call'st along the sand, and haunt 'st the The sea-flag streams through the silent water,

surge,

Restless and sad; as if, in strange accord With the motion and the roar

Of waves that drive to shore,

One spirit did ye urge―
The Mystery-the Word.

IV.

Of thousands thou both sepulchre and pall,
Old Ocean, art! A requiem o'er the dead
From out thy gloomy cells
A tale of mourning tells-
Tells of man's woe and fall,
His sinless glory fled.

Then turn thee, little bird, and take thy flight Where the complaining sea shall sadness bring

Thy spirit never more.

Come, quit with me the shore

For gladness, and the light

And the crimson leaf of the dulse is seen
To blush, like a banner bathed in slaughter.
There, with a light and easy motion,
The fan-coral sweeps through the clear, deep

sea;

And the yellow and scarlet tufts of ocean
Are bending like corn on the upland lea.
And life, in rare and beautiful forms,
Is sporting amid those bowers of stone,
And is safe, when the wrathful spirit of storms
Has made the top of the wave his own.
And when the ship from his fury flies,
Where the myriad voices of ocean roar,
When the wind-god frowns in the murky

skies,

And demons are waiting the wreck on shore;
Then, far below, in the peaceful sea,
Where the waters murmur tranquilly,
The purple mullet and gold-fish rove
Through the bending twigs of the coral grove.

JAMES GATES PERCIVAL

Where birds of summer sing.

RICHARD HENRY DANA.

THE CORAL GROVE.

DEEP in the wave is a coral grove,
Where the purple mullet and gold-fish rove;
Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of
blue

That never are wet with falling dew,
But in bright and changeful beauty shine
Far down in the green and glassy brine.
The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift,
And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow;
From coral rocks the sea-plants lift

Their boughs, where. the tides and billows flow;

The water is calm and still below,

For the winds and waves are absent there,

And the sands are bright as the stars that

glow

In the motionless fields of upper air.

HAMPTON BEACH.

THE sunlight glitters keen and bright,
Where, miles away,

Lies stretching to my dazzled sight
A luminous belt, a misty light,

Beyond the dark pine bluffs and wastes of sandy gray.

The tremulous shadow of the sea!
Against its ground

Of silvery light, rock, hill, and tree,
Still as a picture, clear and free,
With varying outline mark the coast for
miles around.

On-on-we tread with loose-flung rein Our seaward way,

Through dark-green fields and blossoming grain,

Where the wild brier-rose skirts the lane, And bends above our heads the flowering.

locust spray.

Ha! like a kind hand on my brow

Comes this fresh breeze,

Cooling its dull and feverish glow, While through my oeing seems to flow The breath of a new life-the healing of the seas!

Now rest we, where this grassy mound His feet hath set

In the great waters, which have bound His granite ankles greenly round

I sit alone; in foam and spray
Wave after wave

Breaks on the rocks which, stern and gray,
Beneath like fallen Titans lay,

Or murmurs hoarse and strong through mossy cleft and cave.

What heed I of the dusty land
And noisy town?

I see the mighty deep expand

From its white line of glimmering sand

With long and tangled moss, and weeds with To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves

cool spray wet.

Good-bye to pain and care! I take

Mine ease to-day;

Here, where these sunny waters break, And ripples this keen breeze, I shake All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts away.

I draw a freer breath; I seem

Like all I see

Waves in the sun-the white-winged gleam Of sea-birds in the slanting beamAnd far-off sails which flit before the south wind free.

So when Time's veil shall fall asunder,
The soul may know

No fearful change, nor sudden wonder,
Nor sink the weight of mystery under,
But with the upward rise, and with the vast-

ness grow.

And all we shrink from now may seem

No new revealing

Familiar as our childhood's stream,

Or pleasant memory of a dream,

shuts down!

In listless quietude of mind,

I yield to all

The change of cloud and wave and wind; And passive on the flood reclined,

I wander with the waves, and with them rise and fall.

But look, thou dreamer!-wave and shore In shadow lie;

The night-wind warns me back once more To where my native hill-tops o'er Bends like an arch of fire the glowing sunset sky!

So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell! I bear with me

No token stone nor glittering shell, But long and oft shall Memory tell Of this brief, thoughtful, hour of musing by the sea.

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

TO SENECA LAKE.

The loved and cherished Past upon the new ON thy fair bosom, silver lake,

life stealing.

Serene and mild, the untried light May have its dawning;

And, as in Summer's northern light The evening and the dawn unite,

The wild swan spreads his snowy sail, And round his breast the ripples break, As down he bears before the gale

On thy fair bosom, waveless stream, The dipping paddle echoes far,

The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's And flashes in the moonlight gleam,

new morning.

And bright reflects the polar star.

YARROW.

The waves along thy pebbly shore,

There's pleasant Teviot-dale, a land

As blows the north-wind, heave their foam Made blithe with plough and harrow:

And curl around the dashing oar,

As late the boatman hies him home.

How sweet, at set of sun, to view

Thy golden mirror spreading wide, And see the mist of mantling blue

Float round the distant mountain's side.

At midnight hour, as shines the moon,
A sheet of silver spreads below,
And swift she cuts, at highest noon,

Light clouds, like wreaths of purest snow.

On thy fair bosom, silver lake,

Oh! I could ever sweep the oar,— When early birds at morning wake, And evening tells us toil is o'er.

JAMES GATES PERCIVAL.

YARROW UNVISITED.*

FROM Stirling castle we had seen
The mazy Forth unravelled;
Had trod the banks of Clyde and Tay,
And with the Tweed had travelled;
And when we came to Clovenford,
Ther. said 66
winsome marrow:"
my
"Whate'er betide, we'll turn aside,
And see the braes of Yarrow."

"Let Yarrow folk, frae Selkirk town,
Who have been buying, selling,
Go back to Yarrow; 'tis their own-
Each maiden to her dwelling!
On Yarrow's banks let herons feed,
Hares couch, and rabbits burrow!
But we will downward with the Tweed,
Nor turn aside to Yarrow.

"There's Galla Water, Leader Haughs,

Both lying right before us;

Why throw away a needful day
To go in search of Yarrow?

"What's Yarrow but a river bare,

That glides the dark hills under?

There are a thousand such elsewhere,

As worthy of your wonder."

Strange words they seemed, of slight and

scorn;

My true-love sighed for sorrow,

And looked me in the face, to think

I thus could speak of Yarrow!

"Oh, green," said I, "are Yarrow's holms.

And sweet is Yarrow flowing!

Fair hangs the apple frae the rock,

But we will leave it growing.

O'er hilly path, and open strath,

We'll wander Scotland thorough;

But, though so near, we will not turn
Into the dale of Yarrow.

"Let beeves and homebred kine partake
The sweets of Burn-mill meadow;
The swan on still St. Mary's Lake
Float double, swan and shadow!
We will not see them; will not go
To-day, nor yet to-morrow;
Enough, if in our hearts we know
There's such a place as Yarrow.

"Be Yarrow stream unseen, unknown!
It must, or we shall rue it:

We have a vision of our own;
Ah! why should we undo it?
The treasured dreams of times long past,
We'll keep them, winsome Marrow !
For when we're there, although 't is fair,
'T will be another Yarrow!

"If care with freezing years should come,
And wandering seem but folly,—

And Dryborough, where with chiming Tweed Should we be loth to stir from home,
The lintwhites sing in chorus;

And yet be melancholy,-
Should life be dull, and spirits low,
'T will soothe us in our sorrow,
That earth has something yet to show-
The bonny holms of Yarrow!"

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

YARROW VISITED.

AND is this-Yarrow?-This the stream
Of which my fancy cherished,

So faithfully, a waking dream?
An image that hath perished!

O that some minstrel's harp were near,
To utter notes of gladness,
And chase this silence from the air,
That fills my heart with sadness!

Yet why?-a silvery current flows
With uncontrolled meanderings;
Nor have these eyes by greener hills
Been soothed, in all my wanderings.
And, through her depths, Saint Mary's lake
Is visibly delighted;

For not a feature of those hills
Is in the mirror slighted.

A blue sky bends o'er Yarrow vale,
Save where that pearly whiteness
Is round the rising sun diffused-
A tender, hazy brightness;
Mild dawn of promise! that excludes
All profitless dejection;

Though not unwilling here to admit
A pensive recollection.

Where was it that the famous Flower
Of Yarrow Vale lay bleeding?

His bed perchance was yon smooth mound
On which the herd is feeding;
And haply from this crystal pool,
Now peaceful as the morning,
The water-wraith ascended thrice,
And gave his doleful warning.

Delicious is the lay that sings
The haunts of happy lovers-

The path that leads them to the grove,
The leafy grove that covers;
And pity sanctifies the verse
That paints, by strength of sorrow,
The unconquerable strength of love:
Bear witness, rueful Yarrow!

But thou, that didst appear so fair
To fond imagination,

Dost rival in the light of day
Her delicate creation.

Meek loveliness is round thee spread-
A softness still and holy,

The grace of forest charms decayed,
And pastoral melancholy.

That region left, the vale unfolds

Rich groves of lofty stature,

With Yarrow winding through the pomp
Of cultivated nature;

And, rising from those lofty groves,
Behold a ruin hoary!

The shattered front of Newark's towers,
Renowned in border story.

Fair scenes for childhood's opening bloon
For sportive youth to stray in;
For manhood to enjoy his strength,
And age to wear away in!

Yon cottage seems a bower of bliss,

A covert for protection

Of tender thoughts, that nestle there.-The brood of chaste affection.

How sweet, on this autumnal day,
The wild-wood fruits to gather,
And on my true-love's forehead plant
A crest of blooming heather!
And what if I inwreathed my own!
'T were no offence to reason;
The sober hills thus deck their brows
To meet the wintry season.

I see, but not by sight alone,
Loved Yarrow, have I won thee;
A ray of fancy still survives,-
Her sunshine plays upon thee!
Thy ever-youthful waters keep
A course of lively pleasure;
And gladsome notes my lips can breathe,
Accordant to the measure.

The vapors linger round the heights ;
They melt, and soon must vanish;
One hour is theirs, nor more is mine:
Sad thought, which I would banish
But that I know, where'er I go,
Thy genuine image, Yarrow,
Will dwell with me, to heighten joy,
And cheer my mind in sorrow.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

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