LOVE AND POLITICS. A BIRTH-DAY MEDITATION. ANOTHER year! alas, how swift, ALINDA, do these years flit by, Like shadows thrown by clouds that drift Is turn'd within life's volume brief, There are some moments when I feel Had not a right alike to go, But it was love that taught me rhyme, Of words a useless sluggard prove, And often bitter thoughts arise Of what I've lost in loving thee, The gloomy cloud around to see, "Why, what a peasant slave am I," To bow my mind and bend my knee To woman in idolatry, Who takes no thought of mine or me. Thus do my jarring thoughts revolve To dash thine angel image thence; And then for hours and hours I muse On things that might, yet will not be, Till, one by one, my feelings lose Their passionate intensity, Which on wild wing those feelings waft And now again from their gay track I call, as I despondent sit, And even thus my moments fly, My life itself is wiled away; ALINDA, it shall not be so; On pumps and corners posters stick it, WHAT IS SOLITUDE? Nor in the shadowy wood, Not in the crag-hung glen, Not where the echoes brood In caves untrod by men; Where loitering surges break, Where man hath never stood, Talk in earth's secret cells; Breathe ocean's frothing lips, Over the still lake's strand The flower toward it dips; Pluming the mountain's crest, Life tosses in its pines; Coursing the desert's breast, Life in the steed's mane shines. Leave-if thou wouldst be lonely Leave Nature for the crowd; Seek there for one-one onlyWith kindred mind endow'd! There-as with Nature erst Closely thou wouldst communeThe deep soul-music, nursed In either heart, attune! Heart-wearied, thou wilt own, Vainly that phantom woo'd, That thou at last hast known What is true solitude! THE STUDENT'S SONG. THOUGHTS-wild thoughts! O, why will ye wander, Wander away from the task that's before ye? Heart-weak heart! O, why art thou fonder, Fonder of her than ever of glory? What though the laurel for thee hath no glitter; What though thy soul never yearn'd for a name: When did Love garland a brow that was fitter To wake in Love's bosom the wild wish of fame? Doth she not watch o'er thine every endeavour? Leans not her heart in warm faith on thine own? If thou sit doubting and dreaming forever, Too late thou 'It discover that her dream is flown! Ay! though each thought that is tender and glowing Hath yet no errand, save only to herShe may forget thee, while Time is thus flowing; Thou waste thy worship-fond idolater! WITHERING-WITHERING. WITHERING-withering-all are withering- Buds of Ambition too frail to burst. With one who should not wish to live moe. Lifting thy soul toward her place of birth. There are guerdons there more worth thy havingFar more than any these lures of the earth. INSCRIPTION FOR A LADY'S FLORA. BRIGHT as the dew, on early buds that glistens, Sparkle each hope upon thy flower-strewn path; Gay as a bird to its new mate that listens, Be to thy soul each winged joy it hath; Thy lot still lead through ever-blooming bowers, And Time forever talk to thee in flowers. Adored in youth, while yet the summer roses Of glowing girlhood bloom upon thy cheek, And, loved not less when fading, there reposes The lily, that of spring-time past doth speak. Never from Life's garden to be rudely riven, But softly stolen away from earth to heaven. I DO NOT LOVE THEE. I no not love thee-by my word I do not! But, though I charms so perilous eschew not, I do not love thee!-prithee why so coy, then? "TRUST IN THEE." "TRUST in thee?" Ay, dearest! there's no one but must, Unless truth be a fable, in such as thee trust! For who can see heaven's own hue in those eyes, And doubt that truth with it came down from the skies; [young light, While each thought of thy bosom, like morning's Almost ere 'tis born, flashes there on his sight? "Trust in thee?" Why, bright one, thou couldst not betray, While thy heart and thine eyes are forever at play! I KNOW THOU DOST LOVE ME. I KNOW thou dost love me-ay! frown as thou wilt, And curl that beautiful lip, Which I never can gaze on without the guilt Of burning its dew to sip. I know that my heart is reflected in thine, They toward each other dip. Though thou lookest so cold in these halls of light, I will steal, like a thief, in thy heart at night, I will come in thy dreams at the midnight hour, ΤΟ I KNEW not how I loved thee--no! Had told me I must love no more! I knew not how I loved thee!--yet I thought 't were easy to forget- I thought a word would break the spell: I thought, that spell of faith once broken, That love could thus deceive--subdue! Since hope cannot revive again, Why cannot memory perish too? INDIAN SUMMER, 1828. LIGHT as love's smiles, the silvery mist at morn Floats in loose flakes along the limpid river; The blue bird's notes upon the soft breeze borne, As high in air he carols, faintly quiver; The weeping birch, like banners idly waving, Bends to the stream, its spicy branches laving; Beaded with dew, the witch-elm's tassels shiver; The timid rabbit from the furze is peeping, And from the springy spray the squirrel's gayly leaping. I love thee, Autumn, for thy scenery ere The blasts of winter chase the varied dyes That richly deck the slow-declining year; I love the splendour of thy sunset skies, The gorgeous hues that tinge each failing leaf, Lovely as beauty's cheek, as woman's love too, I love the note of each wild bird that flies, [brief; As on the wind he pours his parting lay, And wings his loitering flight to summer climes away. O, Nature! still I fondly turn to thee, With feelings fresh as e'er my childhood's were ;Though wild and passion-toss'd my youth may be, Toward thee I still the same devotion bear; To thee-to thee-though health and hope no more Life's wasted verdure may to me restoreI still can, child-like, come as when in prayer I bow'd my head upon a mother's knee, And deem'd the world, like her, all truth and purity. TOWN REPININGS. RIVER! O, river! thou rovest free, River! O, river! upon thy tide But loses his freedom here, to be On the heart that for thee such devotion hath nursed: Yet not in resentment thy love I resign; I blame not-upbraid not-one motive of thine; Farewell, then, thou loved one-O! loved but too well, Too deeply, too blindly, for language to tellFarewell! thou hast trampled love's faith in the dust, Thou hast torn from my bosom its hope and its trust! Yet, if thy life's current with bliss it would swell, I would pour out my own in this last fond farewell! I WILL LOVE HER NO MORE. I WILL love her no more -'t is a waste of the heart, I will love her no more; it is folly to give not for aught That the worship of years to its altar hath brought. I will love her no more; for no love is without BOAT-SONG. WE court no gale with wooing sail, For what to us are winds, when thus Our merry boat is flying, At twilight dun, when red the sun His crimson pathway dashes. And when the night devours the light, The stars steal out, the skies about, "LET THERE BE LIGHT!" The Eternal spoke, And from the abyss where darkness rode The earliest dawn of nature broke, And light around creation flow'd. "Let there be light!" O'er heaven and earth, The GoD who first the day-beam pour'd, Utter'd again his fiat forth, And shed the gospel's light abroad, Then come, when in the orient first Flushes the signal-light for prayer; Come with the earliest beams that burst From Gon's bright throne of glory there. Come kneel to Him who through the night Hath watch'd above thy sleeping soul, To Him whose mercies, like his light, Are shed abroad from pole to pole. THE WESTERN HUNTER TO HIS MISTRESS. WEND, love, with me, to the deep woods, wend, Where far in the forest the wild flowers keep, Where no watching eye shall over us bend, Save the blossoms that into thy bower peep. Thou shalt gather from buds of the oriole's hue, Whose flaming wings round our pathway flit, From the saffron orchis and lupin blue, And those like the foam on my courser's bit. One steed and one saddle us both shall bear, One hand of each on the bridle meet; And beneath the wrist that entwines me there, An answering pulse from my heart shall beat. I will sing thee many a joyous lay, As we chase the deer by the blue lake-side, While the winds that over the prairie play Shall fan the cheek of my woodland bride. Our home shall be by the cool, bright streams, Where the beaver chooses her safe retreat, And our hearth shall smile like the sun's warm gleams [meet. Through the branches around our lodge that Then wend with me, to the deep woods wend, Where far in the forest the wild flowers keep, Where no watching eye shall over us bend, Save the blossoms that into thy bower peep. THY NAME. Ir comes to me when healths go round, Are freshly from the goblet breathing; Where care in jostling crowds is rife ; Or cold Ambition prompts the strife; It comes to me when smiles are bright In eyes whose spell would once have bound me. It comes--but comes to bring alone Remembrance of some look or tone, Because 't was born or breathed by thee. It comes to me where cloister'd boughs Are lifted from her shrine to God; ROSALIE CLARE. WHO Owns not she's peerless, who calls her not fair, Who questions the beauty of ROSALIE CLARE? Let him saddle his courser and spur to the field, And, though harness'd in proof, he must perish or yield; For no gallant can splinter, no charger may dare And fond wishes for fair ones around offer'd up THINK OF ME, DEAREST. THINK of me, dearest, when day is breaking Is flinging abroad his limbs of light; Let me in thy thoughts come fresh with the light. Think of me, dearest, when day is sinking As they start like gems on the moon-touch'd spray. Think of me, dearest, when round thee smiling Are eyes that melt while they gaze on thee; When words are winning and looks are wiling, And those words and looks, of others, beguiling Thy fluttering heart from love and me. Let me come true in thy thoughts in that hour; Let my trust and my faith-my devotion--have power, When all that can lure to thy young soul is nearest, To summon each truant thought back to me, dearest. WE PARTED IN SADNESS. WE parted in sadness, but spoke not of parting; We talk'd not of hopes that we both must resign, I saw not her eyes, and but one tear-drop starting, Fell down on her hand as it trembled in mine: Each felt that the past we could never recover, Each felt that the future no hope could restore; She shudder'd at wringing the heart of her lover, I dared not to say I must meet her no more. Long years have gone by, and the spring-time smiles One night, 'mid their revels, by BACCHUS were told That his last butt of nectar had somehow run out! But, determined to send round the goblet once more, They sued to the fairer immortals for aid [o'er, In composing a draught, which, till drinking were Should cast every wine ever drank in the shade. Grave CERES herself blithely yielded her corn, And the spirit that lives in each amber hued grain, And which first had its birth from the dews of the morn, Was taught to steal out in bright dew-drops again. POMONA, whose choicest of fruits on the board Were scatter'd profusely in every one's reach, When called on a tribute to cull from the hoard, Express'd the mild juice of the delicate peach. The liquids were mingled, while VENUS looked on, With glances so fraught with sweet magical power, That the honey of Hybla, e'en when they were gone, Has never been missed in the draught from that hour. FLORA then, from her bosom of fragrancy, shook, And with roseate fingers press'd down in the bowl, All dripping and fresh as it came from the brook, The herb whose aroma should flavour the whole. The draught was delicious, each god did exclaim, Though something yet wanting they all did beBut juleps the drink of immortals became, [wail; When Jove himself added a handful of hail. |