246 THE STORM. And where these shapes most thickly glimmer'd by, Silent upon the shore, the fishers fed Their eyes on horror, waiting for the close, Like creatures startled from a trance, they turned Some, shrugging shoulders, homeward turned their eyes, A rush to seaward-black confusion-then The long oars smite, the black boat springs from land! The waves roll on and seem to overwhelm. With blowing hair and onward-gazing eyes The woman stands erect, and grips the helm. . . . Now fearless heart, Meg Blane, or all must die! Round to the liquid ridge the boat leaps light,- LONGING FOR HOME. Athwart the ragged rift the Moon looms pale, And making silvern shadows with her breath, A scream!—and all is still beneath the sky, 247 Robert Buchanan. LONGING FOR HOME. I. A song of a boat: There was once a boat on a billow: Lightly she rocked to her port remote, And the foam was white in her wake like snow, And her frail mast bowed when the breeze would blow, And bent like a wand of willow. 2. I shaded mine eyes one day when a boat I marked her course till a dancing mote 3. I pray you hear my song of a boat, For it is but short: My boat, you shall find none fairer afloat, 248 LONGING FOR HOME. Long I looked out for the lad she bore, On the open desolate sea, And I think he sailed to the heavenly shore, Ah me! A song of a nest:— There was once a nest in a hollow: Down in the mosses and knot-grass pressed, Soft and warm, and full to the brimVetches leaned over it purple and dim, With buttercup buds to follow. 5. I pray you hear my song of a nest, You shall never light, in a summer quest Shall never light on a prouder sitter, 6. I had a nestful once of my own, Ah happy, happy I! Right dearly I loved them: but when they were grown O, one after one they flew away To the better country, the upper day, And what is the shore where I stood to see My boat sail down to the west? DEATH. Can I call that home where I anchor yet, Can I call that home where my nest was set, Nay, but the port where my sailor went, And the land where my nestlings be: Ah me! F. Ingelow. DEATH. THEY die-the dead return not. Misery They are the names of kindred, friend, and lover, These tombs,-alone remain. Misery, my sweetest friend, oh! weep no more! These tombs,-alone remain. P. B. Shelley. 249 250 AIRLY BEACON. AIRLY BEACON. AIRLY Beacon, Airly Beacon; Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon, Oh, the happy hours we lay Courting through the summer's day! Airly Beacon, Airly Beacon; All alone on Airly Beacon, C. Kingsley. THE MERRY LARK WAS UP AND SINGING. THE merry, merry lark was up and singing, Now the hare is snared and dead beside the snow-yard, C. Kingsley. |