Stanzas For Music: There's Not A Joy The World Can Give
There's not a joy the world can give like that it takes away
When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull decay;
'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, which fades so fast,
But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth itself be past.
Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of happiness
Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt, or ocean of excess:
The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in vain
The shore to which their shivered sail shall never stretch again.
Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself comes down;
It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its own;
That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears,
And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the ice appears.
Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the breast,
Through midnight hours that yield no more their former hope of rest,
'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruined turret wreath—
All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and grey beneath.
Oh, could I feel as I have felt, or be what I have been,
Or weep as I could once have wept, o'er many a vanished scene;
As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish though they be,
So, midst the withered waste of life, those tears would flow to me.
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The Visionary Portrait
I.
As by his lonely hearth he sate,
The shadow of a welcome dream
Pass'd o'er his heart,--disconsolate
His home did seem;
Comfort in vain was spread around,
For something still was wanting found.
II.
Therefore he thought of one who might
For ever in his presence stay;
Whose dream should be of him by night,
Whose smile should be for him by day;
And the sweet vision, vague and far,
Rose on his fancy like a star.
II.
'Let her be young, yet not a child,
Whose light and inexperienced mirth
Is all too wingéd and too wild
For sober earth,--
Too rainbow-like such mirth appears,
And fades away in misty tears.
IV.
'Let youth's fresh rose still gently bloom
Upon her smooth and downy cheek,
Yet let a shadow, not of gloom,
But soft and meek,
Tell that some sorrow she hath known,
Tho' not a sorrow of her own.
V.
'And let her eyes be of the grey,
The soft grey of the brooding dove,
Full of the sweet and tender ray
Of modest love;
For fonder shows that dreamy hue
Than lustrous black or heavenly blue.
VI.
'Let her be full of quiet grace,
No sparkling wit with sudden glow
Bright'ning her purely chisell'd face
And placid brow;
Not radiant to the stranger's eye,--
A creature easily pass'd by;
VII.
'But who, once seen, with untold power
For ever haunts the yearning heart,
Raised from the crowd that self-same hour
To dwell apart,
All sainted and enshrined to be
The idol of our memory!
VIII.
'And oh! let Mary be her name
It hath a sweet and gentle sound
At which no glories dear to fame
Come crowding round,
But which the dreaming heart beguiles
With holy thoughts and household smiles
IX.
'With peaceful meetings, welcomes kind,
And love, the same in joy and tears,
And gushing intercourse of mind
Thro' faithful years;
Oh! dream of something half divine,
Be real--be mortal--and be mine!'
poem by Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton
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The Reply Of The Fountain
HOW deep within each human heart,
A thousand treasured feelings lie;
Things precious, delicate, apart,
Too sensitive for human eye.
Our purest feelings, and our best,
Yet shrinking from the common view;
Rarely except in song exprest,
And yet how tender, and how true!
They wake, and know their power, when eve
Flings on the west its transient glow;
Yet long dark shadows dimly weave
A gloom round some green path below.
Who dreams not then—the young dream on—
Life traced at hope's delicious will;
And those whose youth of heart is gone,
Perhaps have visions dearer still.
They rise, too, when expected least,
When gay yourself, amid the gay,
The heart from revelry hath ceased
To muse o'er hours long past away.
And who can think upon the past
And not weep o'er it as a grave?
How many leaves life's wreath has cast!
What lights have sunk beneath the wave!
But most these deep emotions rise
When, drooping o'er our thoughts alone,
Our former dearest sympathies
Come back, and claim us for their own.
Such mood is on the maiden's mind
Who bends o'er yon clear fount her brow;
Long years, that leave their trace behind,
Long years, are present with her now.
Yet, once before she asked a sign
From that wild fountain's plaintive song;
And silvery, with the soft moonshine,
Those singing waters past along.
It was an hour of beauty, made
For the young heart's impassioned mood,
For love of its sweet self afraid,
For hope that colours solitude.
'Alas,' the maiden sighed, 'since first
I said, Oh fountain, read my doom;
What vainest fancies have I nurst,
Of which I am myself the tomb!
'The love was checked—the hope was vain,
I deemed that I could feel no more;
Why, false one, did we meet again,
To show thine influence was not o'er?
'I thought that I could never weep
Again, as I had wept for thee,
That love was buried cold and deep,
That pride and scorn kept watch by me.
'My early hopes, my early tears
Were now almost forgotten things,
And other cares, and other years
Had brought what all experience brings—
'Indifference, weariness, disdain,
That taught and ready smile which grows
A habit soon—as streams retain
The shape and light in which they froze.
'Again I met that faithless eye,
Again I heard that charmed tongue;
I felt they were my destiny,
I knew again the spell they flung.
'Ah! years have fled, since last his name
Was breathed amid the twilight dim;
It was to dream of him I came,
And now again I dream of him.
'But changed and cold, my soul has been
Too deeply wrung, too long unmoved,
Too hardened in life's troubled scene
To love as I could once have loved.
'Sweet fountain, once I asked thy waves
To whisper hope's enchanted spell;
Now I but ask thy haunted caves
To teach me how to say farewell.'
She leaned her head upon her hand,
She gazed upon that fountain lone
Which wandered by its wild-flower strand
With a low, mournful, ceaseless moan.
It soothed her with a sweet deceit
Of pity, murmured on the breeze;
Ah deep the grief, which seeks to cheat
Itself with fantasies like these.
poem by Letitia Elizabeth Landon
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Growing Old
What is it to grow old?
Is it to lose the glory of the form,
The lustre of the eye?
Is it for beauty to forego her wreath?
Yes, but not for this alone.
Is it to feel our strength
Not our bloom only, but our strength decay?
Is it to feel each limb
Grow stiffer, every function less exact,
Each nerve more weakly strung?
Yes, this, and more! but not,
Ah, 'tis not what in youth we dreamed 'twould be!
'Tis not to have our life
Mellowed and softened as with sunset-glow,
A golden day's decline!
'Tis not to see the world
As from a height, with rapt prophetic eyes,
And heart profoundly stirred;
And weep, and feel the fulness of the past,
The years that are no more!
It is to spend long days
And not once feel that we were ever young.
It is to add, immured
In the hot prison of the present, month
To month with weary pain.
It is to suffer this,
And feel but half, and feebly, what we feel:
Deep in our hidden heart
Festers the dull remembrance of a change,
But no emotion none.
It is last stage of all
When we are frozen up within, and quite
The phantom of ourselves,
To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost
Which blamed the living man.
poem by Matthew Arnold (1867)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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To Caroline
Think'st thou I saw thy beauteous eyes,
Suffus'd in tears, implore to stay;
And heard unmov'd thy plenteous sighs,
Which said far more than words can say?
Though keen the grief thy tears exprest,
When love and hope lay both o'erthrown;
Yet still, my girl, this bleeding breast
Throbb'd, with deep sorrow, as thine own.
But, when our cheeks with anguish glow'd,
When thy sweet lips were join'd to mine;
The tears that from my eyelids flow'd
Were lost in those which fell from thine.
Thou could'st not feel my burning cheek,
Thy gushing tears had quench'd its flame,
And, as thy tongue essay'd to speak,
In sighs alone it breath'd my name.
And yet, my girl, we weep in vain,
In vain our fate in sighs deplore;
Remembrance only can remain,
But that, will make us weep the more.
Again, thou best belov'd, adieu!
Ah! if thou canst, o'ercome regret,
Nor let thy mind past joys review,
Our only hope is, to forget!
The Youth By The Brook
Beside the brook the boy reclined
And wove his flowery wreath,
And to the waves the wreath consigned--
The waves that danced beneath.
"So fleet mine hours," he sighed, "away
Like waves that restless flow:
And so my flowers of youth decay
Like those that float below."
"Ask not why I, alone on earth,
Am sad in life's young time;
To all the rest are hope and mirth
When spring renews its prime.
Alas! the music Nature makes,
In thousand songs of gladness--
While charming all around me, wakes
My heavy heart to sadness."
"Ah! vain to me the joys that break
From spring, voluptuous are;
For only one 't is mine to seek--
The near, yet ever far!
I stretch my arms, that shadow-shape
In fond embrace to hold;
Still doth the shade the clasp escape--
The heart is unconsoled!"
"Come forth, fair friend, come forth below,
And leave thy lofty hall,
The fairest flowers the spring can know
In thy dear lap shall fall!
Clear glides the brook in silver rolled,
Sweet carols fill the air;
The meanest hut hath space to hold
A happy loving pair!"
poem by Friedrich Schiller
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His Youth
Dying? I am not dying. Are you mad?
You think I need to ask for heavenly grace?
\I\ think \you\ are a fiend, who would be glad
To see me struggle in death's cold embrace.
'But, man you lie! for I am strong-in truth
Stronger than I have been in years; and soon
I shall feel young again as in my youth,
My glorious youth-life's one great priceless boon.
'O youth, youth, youth! O God, that golden time,
When proud and glad I laughed the hours away.
Why, there's no sacrifice (perhaps no crime)
I'd pause at, could it make me young to-day.
'But I'm not \old\! I grew-just ill, somehow;
Grew stiff of limb, and weak, and dim of sight.
It was but sickness. I am better now,
Oh, vastly better, ever since last night.
'And I could weep warm floods of happy tears
To think my strength is coming back at last,
For I have dreamed of such an hour for years,
As I lay thinking of my glorious past.
'You shake your head? Why, man, if you were sane
I'd strike you to my feet, I would, in truth.
How dare you tell me that my hopes are vain?
How dare you say I have outlived my youth?
''In heaven I may regain it?' Oh, be still!
I want no heaven but what my glad youth gave.
Its long, bright hours, its rapture and its thrill-
O youth, youth, youth! it is my \youth\ I crave.
'There is no heaven! There's nothing but a deep
And yawning grave from which I shrink in fear.
I am not sure of even rest or sleep;
Perhaps we lie and \think\, as I have here.
'Think, think, think, think, as we lie there and rot,
And hear the young above us laugh in glee.
How dare you say I'm dying! \I am not\.
I would curse God if such a thing could be.
'Why, see me stand! why, hear this strong, full breath-
Dare you repeat that silly, base untruth?'
A cry-a fall-the silence known as death
Hushed his wild words. Well, has he found his youth?
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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VIII. To the River Itchin, near Winton.
ITCHIN, when I behold thy banks again,
Thy crumbling margin, and thy silver breast,
On which the self-same tints still seem to rest,
Why feels my heart the shiv'ring sense of pain?
Is it, that many a summer's day has past
Since, in life's morn, I carol'd on thy side?
Is it, that oft, since then, my heart has sigh'd,
As Youth, and Hope's delusive gleams, flew fast?
Is it that those, who circled on thy shore,
Companions of my youth, now meet now more?
Whate'er the cause, upon thy banks I bend
Sorrowing, yet feel such solace at my heart,
As at the meeting of some long-lost friend,
From whom, in happier hours, we wept to part.
poem by William Lisle Bowles
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The Farewell To The Dead
Come near!-ere yet the dust
Soil the bright paleness of the settled brow,
Look on your brother, and embrace him now,
In still and solemn trust!
Come near!-once more let kindred lips be press'd
On his cold cheek; then bear him to his rest!
Look yet on this young face!
What shall the beauty, from amongst us gone,
Leave of its image, ev'n where most it shone,
Gladdening its hearth and race?
Dim grows the semblance on man's heart impress'd-
-Come near, and bear the beautiful to rest!
Ye weep, and it is well!
For tears befit earth's partings!-Yesterday
Song was upon the lips of this pale clay,
And sunshine seem'd to dwell
Where'er he mov'd-the welcome and the bless'd!
-Now gaze! and bear the silent unto rest!
Look yet on him, whose eye
Meets yours no more, in sadness or in mirth!
Was he not fair amidst the sons of earth,
The beings born to die?
-But not where death has power may love be bless'd--
Come near! and bear ye the belov'd to rest!
How may the mother's heart
Dwell on her son, and dare to hope again?
The spring's rich promise hath been given in vain,
The lovely must depart!
Is he not gone, our brightest and our best?
Come near! and bear the early-call'd to rest!
Look on him! is he laid
To slumber from the harvest or the chase?
-Too still and sad the smile upon his face,
Yet that, ev'n that, must fade!
Death holds not long unchang'd his fairest guest,-
Come near! and bear the mortal to his rest!
His voice of mirth hath ceas'd
Amidst the vineyards! there is left no place
For him whose dust receives your vain embrace,
At the gay bridal feast!
Earth must take earth to moulder on her breast;
Come near! weep o'er him! bear him to his rest!
Yet mourn ye not as they
Whose spirit's light is quench'd!-for him the past
Is seal'd. He may not fall, he may not cast
His birthright's hope away!
All is not here of our belov'd and bless'd-
-Leave ye the sleeper with his God to rest!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Tears of the Greatest
oh! tears, holy are you who comes to my emptiness, of
where ever I go, you have been the mirror of what I am
true today who brings me tomorrow, and always in my
midst and night stay in my bedside play, until the last
minute of my last day, says a goodbye
you swift my deep slumber, hugging what I feel and
express in your honest tears, where the inner passion
of feeling resemble in my immortal soul, everything
desire the joy and the pain my heart adore
touch me, squeezes and grips my whole heart that grief,
leave me alone in the shadow of the wilderness and hold
me not to accept my triumphant happiness, where every
teardrops tell the meaning of myself, give me the
wisdom to hold the past and the memories that takes so
fast
now that i'm in your side, where do I go from here, where
should my loving feeling subdue when you did come
always to my way, you who have been in the path I’ve go,
believe that you will be with me until it last for a lifetime,
leaving the end of the day and longing to live in the end time
life wait me not, the tears I give it up, take me to live in
your loving mortal eye, will I’ve stay, look I'm always in your
way, sheltering the feeling of what you believe, shows
me of what is life is all about, for in every tears it fall there
is always a call and your heart I know is full
let my tears come and go, I waited you for me to show,
happiness and failure you wanted me to cried, for in every
teardrops you fall my heart leads you know, that my eyes
want you stay in every way I go, for in my journey, my tears
becomes in me……
poem by Antonio Liao
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The Lunatic Girl
Most beautiful, most gentle! Yet how lost
To all that gladdens the fair earth; the eye
That watched her being; the maternal care
That kept and nourished her; and the calm light
That steals from our own thoughts, and softly rests
On youth's green vallies and smooth-sliding waters.
Alas! few suns of life, and fewer winds,
Had withered or had wasted the fresh rose
That bloomed upon her cheek; but one chill frost
Came in that early Autumn, when ripe thought
Is rich and beautiful, and blighted it;
And the fair stalk grew languid day by day,
And drooped -- and drooped, and shed its many leaves.
'Tis said that some have died of love; and some,
Love's passionate feelings and heart-wasting cares,
have spurned life's threshold with a desperate foot:
And others have gone mad,-- and she was one!--
Her lover died at sea; and they had felt
A coldness for each other when they parted;
But love returned again, and to her ear
Came tidings that the ship which bore her lover
Had sullenly gone down at sea, and all were lost.
I saw her in her native vale, when high
The aspiring lark up from the reedy river
Mounted, on cheerful pinion; and she sat
Casting smooth pebbles into a clear fountain,
And marking how they sunk; and oft she sighed
For him that perished thus in the vast deep.
She had a sea-shell, that her lover brought
From the far-distant ocean, and she pressed
Its smooth cold lips unto her ear, and thought
It whispered tiding of the dark blue sea;
And sad, she cried, 'The tides are out!-- and now
I see his corse upon the stormy beach!'
Around her neck a string of rose-lipped shells,
And coral, and white pearl, was loosely hung;
And close beside her lay a delicate fan,
Made of the halcyon's blue wing; and when
She looked upon it, it would calm her thoughts
As that bird calms the ocean,-- for it gave
Mournful, yet pleasant, memory. Once I marked,
When through the mountain hollows and green woods,
That bent beneath its footsteps, the loud wind
Came with a voice as of the restless deep,
She raised her head, and on her pale, cold cheek
A beauty of diviner seeming came;
And then she spread her hands, and smiled, as if
She welcomed a long absent friend,-- and then
Shrunk timorously back again, and wept.
I turned away a multitude of thoughts,
Mournful and dark, were crowding on my mind;
And as I left that lost and ruined one,--
A living monument that still on earth
There is warm love and deep sincerity,--
She gazed upon the west, where the blue sky
Held, like an ccean, in its wide embrace
Those fairy islands of bright cloud, that lay
So calm and quietly in the thin ether.
And then she pointed where, alone and high,
One little cloud sailed onward, like a lost
And wandering bark, and fainter grew, and fainter,
And soon was swallowed up in the blue depths;
And, when it sunk away, she turned again
With sad despondency and tears to earth.
Three long and weary months -- yet not a whisper
Of stern reproach for that cold parting! Then
She sat no longer by her favorite fountain!--
She was at rest forever.
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Evening Prayer at a Girl's School
HUSH! 'tis a holy hour-the quiet room
Seems like a temple, while yon soft lamp sheds
A faint and starry radiance, through the gloom
And the sweet stillness, down on fair young heads,
With all their clustering locks, untouch'd by care,
And bow'd, as flowers are bow'd with night, in prayer.
Gaze on-'tis lovely!-Childhood's lip and cheek,
Mantling beneath its earnest brow of thought-
Gaze-yet what seest thou in those fair, and meek,
And fragile things, as but for sunshine wrought?-
Thou seest what grief must nurture for the sky,
What death must fashion for eternity!
O! joyous creatures! that will sink to rest,
Lightly, when those pure orisons are done,
As birds, with slumber's honey-dew opprest,
'Midst the dim folded leaves, at set of sun-
Life up your hearts! though yet no sorrow lies
Dark in the summer-heaven of those clear eyes.
Though fresh within your breasts the untroubled springs
Of hope make melody where'er ye tread,
And o'er your sleep bright shadows, from the wings
Of spirits visiting but youth, be spread;
Yet in those flute-like voices, mingling low,
Is woman's tenderness-how soon her woe!
Her lot is on you-silent tears to weep,
And patient smiles to wear through suffering's hour,
And sumless riches, from affection's deep,
To pour on broken reeds-a wasted shower!
And to make idols, and to find them clay,
And to bewail that worship-therefore pray!
Her lot is on you-to be found untired,
Watching the stars out by the bed of pain,
With a pale cheek, and yet a brow inspired,
And a true heart of hope, though hope be vain;
Meekly to bear with wrong, to cheer decay,
And oh! to love through all things-therefore pray!
And take the thought of this calm vesper time,
With its low murmuring sounds and silvery light,
On through the dark days fading from their prime,
As a sweet dew to keep your souls from blight!
Earth will forsake-O! happy to have given
The unbroken heart's first fragrance unto Heaven.
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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The Resurrection
I thought I had forever lost,
Alas, though still so young,
The tender joys and sorrows all,
That unto youth belong;
The sufferings sweet, the impulses
Our inmost hearts that warm;
Whatever gives this life of ours
Its value and its charm.
What sore laments, what bitter tears
O'er my sad state I shed,
When first I felt from my cold heart
Its gentle pains had fled!
Its throbs I felt no more; my love
Within me seemed to die;
Nor from my frozen, senseless breast
Escaped a single sigh!
I wept o'er my sad, hapless lot;
The life of life seemed lost;
The earth an arid wilderness,
Locked in eternal frost;
The day how dreary, and the night
How dull, and dark, and lone!
The moon for me no brightness had,
No star in heaven shone.
And yet the old love was the cause
Of all the tears I shed;
Still in my inmost breast I felt
The heart was not yet dead.
My weary fancy still would crave
The images it loved,
And its capricious longings still
A source of sorrow proved.
But e'en that lingering spark of grief
Was soon within me spent,
And I the strength no longer had
To utter a lament.
And there I lay, stunned, stupefied,
Nor asked for comfort more;
My heart to hopeless, blank despair
Itself had given o'er.
How changed, alas, was I from him
Who once with passion thrilled,
Whose ardent soul was ever, once,
With sweet illusions filled!
The swallow to my window, still,
Would come, to greet the dawn;
But his sweet song no echo found
In my poor heart, forlorn.
Nor pleased me more, in autumn gray,
Upon the hill-side lone,
The cheerful vesper-bell, or light
Of the departing sun.
In vain the evening star I saw
Above the silent vale,
And vainly warbled in the grove
The plaintive nightingale.
And you, ye furtive glances, bright,
From gentle eyes that rove,
The sweet, the gracious messages
Of first immortal Love;
The soft, white hand, that tenderly
My own hand seemed to woo;
All, all your magic spells were vain,
My torpor to subdue.
Of every pleasure quite bereft,
Sad but of tranquil mien;
A state of perfect littleness,
Yet with a face serene;
Save for the lingering wish, indeed,
In death to sink to rest,
The force of all desire was spent
In my exhausted breast.
As some poor, feeble wanderer,
With age and sorrow bent,
The April of my years, alas,
Thus listlessly I spent;
Thus listlessly, thus wearily,
Didst thou consume, O heart,
Those golden days, ineffable,
So swiftly that depart.
_Who_, from this heavy, heedless rest
Awakens me again?
What new, what magic power is this,
I feel within me reign?
Ye motions sweet, ye images,
Ye throbs, illusions blest,
Ah, no,--ye are not then shut out
Forever from this breast?
The glorious light of golden days
Do ye again unfold?
The old affections that I lost,
Do I once more behold?
Now, as I gaze upon the sky,
Or on the verdant fields,
Each thing with sorrow me inspires,
And each a pleasure yields.
The mountain, forest, and the shore
Once more my heart rejoice;
The fountain speaks to me once more,
The sea hath found a voice.
Who, after all this apathy,
Restores to me my tears?
Each moment, as I look around,
How changed the world appears!
Hath hope, perchance, O my poor heart,
Beguiled thee of thy pain?
Ah, no, the gracious smile of hope
I ne'er shall see again.
Nature bestowed these impulses,
And these illusions blest;
Their inborn influence, in me,
By suffering was suppressed;
But not annulled, not overcome
By cruel blows of Fate;
Nor by the inauspicious frown
Of Truth, importunate!
I know she has no sympathy
For fond imaginings;
I know that Nature, too, is deaf,
Nor heeds our sufferings;
That for our _good_ she nothing cares,
Our _being_, only heeds;
And with the sight of our distress
Her wild caprices feeds.
I know the poor man pleads in vain,
For others' sympathy;
That scornfully, or heedlessly,
All from his presence flee;
That both for genius and for worth,
This age has no respect;
That all who cherish lofty aims
Are left to cold neglect.
And you, ye eyes so tremulous
With lustre all divine,
I know how false your splendors are,
Where no true love doth shine.
No love mysterious and profound
Illumes you with its glow;
Nor gleams one spark of genial fire
Beneath that breast of snow.
Nay, it is wont to laugh to scorn
Another's tender pain;
The fervent flame of heavenly love
To treat with cold disdain.
Yet I with thankfulness once more
The old illusions greet,
And feel, with shock of pleased surprise,
The heart within me beat.
To thee alone this force renewed,
This vital power I owe;
From thee alone, my faithful heart,
My only comforts flow.
I feel it is the destiny
Of every noble mind,
In Fate, in Fortune, Beauty, and the World,
An enemy to find:
But while thou liv'st, nor yield'st to Fate,
Contending without fear,
I will not tax with cruelty
The power that placed me here.
poem by Count Giacomo Leopardi
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An Evening Walk in Spring
IT was but some few nights ago
I wandered down this quiet lane;
I pray that I may never know
The feelings then I felt, again.
The leaves were shining all about,
You might almost have seen them springing;
I heard the cuckoo’s simple shout,
And all the little birds were singing.
It was not dull, the air was clear,
All lovely sights and sounds to deal,
My eyes could see, my ears could hear,
Only my heart, it would not feel;
And yet that it should not be so,
My mind kept telling me within;
Though nought was wrong that I did know,
I thought I must have done some sin.
For I am sure as I can be,
That they who have been wont to look
On all in Nature’s face they see,
Even as in the Holy Book;
They who with pure and humble eyes
Have gazed and read her lessons high,
And taught their spirits to be wise
In love and human sympathy,—
That they can soon and surely tell
When aught has gone amiss within,
When the mind is not sound and well,
Nor the soul free from taint of sin.
For as God’s Spirit from above,
So Beauty is to them below,
And when they slight that holy love,
Their hearts that presence may not know.
So I turned home the way I came,
With downcast looks and heavy heart,
A guilty thing and full of shame,
With a dull grief that had no smart.
It chanced when I was nearly there
That all at once I raised my eyes—
Was it a dream, or vision rare,
That then they saw before them rise?
I see it now, before me here,
As often, often I have done,
As bright as it could then appear,
All shining in the setting sun.
Elms, with their mantling foliage spread,
And tall dark poplars rising out,
And blossomed orchards, white and red,
Cast, like a long low fence, about;
And in the midst the grey church-tower,
With one slight turret at its side,
Bringing to mind with silent power
Those thousand homes the elm-trees hide.
And then there came the thought of one
Who on his bed of sickness lay,
Whilst I beneath the setting sun
Was dreaming this sweet hour away.
I thought of hearts for him that beat,
Of aching eyes their watch that kept;
The sister’s and the mother’s seat—
And oh! I thought I should have wept.
And oh, my spirit melted then,
The weight fell off me that I bore,
And now I felt in truth again
The lovely things that stood before.
O blessed, blessed scene, to thee,
For that thy sweet and softening power,
I could have fallen upon my knee,
Thy stately elms, thy grey church-tower.
So then I took my homeward way,
My heart in sweet and holy frame,
With spirit, I may dare to say,
More good and soft than when I came.
poem by Arthur Hugh Clough
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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I see around me tombstones grey
I see around me tombstones grey
Stretching their shadows far away.
Beneath the turf my footsteps tread
Lie low and lone the silent dead -
Beneath the turf - beneath the mould -
Forever dark, forever cold -
And my eyes cannot hold the tears
That memory hoards from vanished years
For Time and Death and Mortal pain
Give wounds that will not heal again -
Let me remember half the woe
I've seen and heard and felt below,
And Heaven itself - so pure and blest,
Could never give my spirit rest -
Sweet land of light! thy children fair
Know nought akin to our despair -
Nor have they felt, nor can they tell
What tenants haunt each mortal cell,
What gloomy guests we hold within -
Torments and madness, tears and sin!
Well - may they live in ectasy
Their long eternity of joy;
At least we would not bring them down
With us to weep, with us to groan,
No - Earth would wish no other sphere
To taste her cup of sufferings drear;
She turns from Heaven with a careless eye
And only mourns that we must die!
Ah mother, what shall comfort thee
In all this boundless misery?
To cheer our eager eyes a while
We see thee smile; how fondly smile!
But who reads not through that tender glow
Thy deep, unutterable woe:
Indeed no dazzling land above
Can cheat thee of thy children's love.
We all, in life's departing shine,
Our last dear longings blend with thine;
And struggle still and strive to trace
With clouded gaze, thy darling face.
We would not leave our native home
For any world beyond the Tomb.
No - rather on thy kindly breast
Let us be laid in lasting rest;
Or waken but to share with thee
A mutual immortality -
poem by Emily Jane Brontë
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A Day Dream
On a sunny brae, alone I lay
One summer afternoon;
It was the marriage-time of May
With her young lover, June.
From her mother's heart, seemed loath to part
That queen of bridal charms,
But her father smiled on the fairest child
He ever held in his arms.
The trees did wave their plumy crests,
The glad birds caroled clear;
And I, of all the wedding guests,
Was only sullen there!
There was not one, but wished to shun
My aspect void of cheer;
The very grey rocks, looking on,
Asked, "What do you here?"
And I could utter no reply;
In sooth, I did not know
Why I had brought a clouded eye
To greet the general glow.
So, resting on a heathy bank,
I took my heart to me;
And we together sadly sank
Into a reverie.
We thought, "When winter comes again,
Where will these bright things be?
All vanished, like a vision vain,
An unreal mockery!
The birds that now so blithely sing,
Through deserts, frozen dry,
Poor spectres of the perished spring,
In famished troops, will fly.
And why should we be glad at all?
The leaf is hardly green,
Before a token of its fall
Is on the surface seen!"
Now, whether it were really so,
I never could be sure;
But as in fit of peevish woe,
I stretched me on the moor.
A thousand thousand gleaming fires
Seemed kindling in the air;
A thousand thousand silvery lyres
Resounded far and near:
Methought, the very breath I breathed
Was full of sparks divine,
And all my heather-couch was wreathed
By that celestial shine!
And, while the wide earth echoing rung
To their strange minstrelsy,
The little glittering spirits sung,
Or seemed to sing, to me.
"O mortal! mortal! let them die;
Let time and tears destroy,
That we may overflow the sky
With universal joy!
Let grief distract the sufferer's breast,
And night obscure his way;
They hasten him to endless rest,
And everlasting day.
To thee the world is like a tomb,
A desert's naked shore;
To us, in unimagined bloom,
It brightens more and more!
And could we lift the veil, and give
One brief glimpse to thine eye,
Thou wouldst rejoice for those that live,
Because they live to die."
The music ceased; the noonday dream,
Like dream of night, withdrew;
But Fancy, still, will sometimes deem
Her fond creation true.
poem by Emily Jane Brontë
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The Despair
Beneath this gloomy shade,
By Nature only for my sorrows made,
I'll spend this voyce in crys,
In tears I'll waste these eyes
By Love so vainly fed;
So Lust of old the Deluge punished.
Ah wretched youth! said I,
'Ah, wretched youth!' twice did I sadly cry:
'Ah, wretched youth!' the fields and floods reply.
When thoughts of Love I entertain,
I meet no words but 'Never,' and 'In vain.'
'Never' alas that dreadful name
Which fuels the infernal flame:
'Never,' My time to come must waste;
'In vain,' torments the present and the past.
'In vain, in vain!' said I;
'In vain, in vain!' twice did I sadly cry;
'In vain, in vain!' the fields and floods reply.
No more shall fields or floods do so;
For I to shades more dark and silent go:
All this world's noise appears to me
A dull ill-acted comedy:
No comfort to my wounded sight,
In the suns busy and imperti'nent Light.
Then down I laid my head;
Down on cold earth; and for a while was dead,
And my freed soul to a strange somewhere fled.
'Ah, sottish Soul' said I,
When back to its cage again I saw it fly;
'Fool to resume her broken chain!
And row her galley here again!'
'Fool, to that body to return
Where it condemn'd and destin'd is to burn!
Once dead, how can it be,
Death should a thing so pleasant seem to thee,
That thou should'st come to live it o're again in me?'
poem by Abraham Cowley
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A Voyager's Dream Of Land
His very heart athirst
To gaze at nature in her green array,
Upon the ship's tall side he stands, possess'd
With visions prompted by intense desire;
Fair fields appear below, such as he left
Far distant, such as he would die to find:
He seeks them headlong, and is seen no more. ~ Cowper
The hollow dash of waves!–the ceaseless roar!
Silence, ye billows! vex my soul no more.
There's a spring in the woods by my sunny home,
Afar from the dark sea's tossing foam;
Oh! the fall of that fountain is sweet to hear,
As a song from the shore to the sailor's ear!
And the sparkle which up to the sun it throws,
Thro' the feathery fern and the olive boughs,
And the gleam on its path as it steals away
Into deeper shades from the sultry day,
And the large water-lilies that o'er its bed
Their pearly leaves to the soft light spread,
They haunt me! I dream of that bright spring's flow,
I thirst for its rills, like a wounded roe!
Be still, thou sea-bird, with thy clanging cry!
My spirit sickens, as thy wing sweeps by.
Know ye my home, with the lulling sound
Of leaves from the lime and the chestnut round?
Know ye it, brethren! where bower'd it lies,
Under the purple of southern skies?
With the streamy gold of the sun that shines
In thro' the cloud of its clustering vines,
And the summer-breath of the myrtle-flowers,
Borne from the mountain in dewy hours,
And the fire-fly's glance thro' the dark'ning shades,
Like shooting stars in the forest-glades,
And the scent of the citron at eve's dim fall
Speak! have ye known, have ye felt them all?
The heavy rolling surge! the rocking mast!
Hush! give my dream's deep music way, thou blast!
Oh! the glad sounds of the joyous earth!
The notes of the singing cicala's mirth,
The murmurs that live in the mountain pines,
The sighing of reeds as the day declines,
The wings flitting home thro' the crimson glow
That steeps the wood when the sun is low,
The voice of the night-bird that sends a thrill
To the heart of the leaves when the winds are still
I hear them! round me they rise, they swell,
They call back my spirit with Hope to dwell,
They come with a breath from the fresh spring-time,
And waken my youth in its hour of prime.
The white foam dashes high away, away!
Shroud my green land no more, thou blinding spray!
It is there! down the mountains I see the sweep
Of the chestnut forests, the rich and deep,
With the burden and glory of flowers that they bear,
Floating upborne on the blue summer-air,
And the light pouring thro' them in tender gleams,
And the flashing forth of a thousand streams!
Hold me not, brethren! I go, I go,
To the hills of my youth, where the myrtles blow,
To the depths of the woods, where the shadows rest,
Massy and still, on the greensward's breast,
To the rocks that resound with the water's play
I hear the sweet laugh of my fount give way!
Give way! the booming surge, the tempest's roar,
The sea-bird's wail, shall vex my soul no more.
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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Grey-eyed mabel
I gazed on orbs of flashing black;
I met the glow of hazel light;
I marked the hue of laughing blue,
That sparkled in the festive night.
But none could fling a lasting spell
To hold me with unchanging power--
The chains they cast were never fast
Beyond the gay and fleeting hour--
Till Grey-eyed Mabel's gentle glance,
With blushing sense and beauty rife,
Bade my soul cry with burning sigh,
'I'm thine, and only thine, for life.'
Black, blue, and hazel stars have set,
But Mabel's grey eyes lead me yet.
What was it in sweet Mabel's eyes
That told me what no others told,
That roused the dull, that pleased the wise,
That charmed the young and cheered the old?
What was it held my world-worn breast
In holy thrall--unknown before?
What was it those grey eyes expressed
That made me worship and adore?
It was the pure and tender ray
That filled those eyes in joy or woe;
It was the beam that could not play
Without the fountain stream below;
It was the beam of simple truth,
Of Woman's faith and trusting Youth.
Those soft, grey eyes were watched by mine
With earnest, deep, and secret prayer;
I knew, I felt, my earthly shrine
Was found and fixed for ever--there.
I poured my heart one moonlit night
Into sweet Mabel's listening ear;
Our mutual vow, from then till now,
Bound each to each--fond, firm, and dear.
Our boys and girls are growing round,
And all give promise, brave and fair,
But one, young cherub form is found
First in my love, my hope, my care.
And why?--ah! why? My soul replies,
'She has dear Mabel's soft, grey eyes.'
poem by Eliza Cook
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Lover's Gifts XL: A Message Came
A message came from my youth of vanished days, saying, " I wait for
you among the quivering of unborn May, where smiles ripen for tears
and hours ache with songs unsung."
It says, "Come to me across the worn-out track of age, through
the gates of death. For dreams fade, hopes fail, the fathered
fruits of the year decay, but I am the eternal truth, and you shall
meet me again and again in your voyage of life from shore to
shore."
poem by Rabindranath Tagore
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When!
WHEN I am young again I'll hoard my bliss,
Nor deem that inexhaustible it is,
Remembering old age comes after this,
Joy grows to pain;
Nor waste one moment of youth's rose-sweet hours,
Nor trample one of all its countless flowers,
But drink the summer sun and soft spring showers,
When I am young again.
I will be wise with wisdom dearly won
By those who through life's wood have nearly run;
Learn what to do, and what to leave undone,
Risk or refrain.
I will not seek into my mouth to take
The bitter apple of the acrid lake,
But at clear fountains all my thirsts will slake,
When I am young again.
I will not brush the bloom to reach the core,
Remembering how it chanced with me before,
And bloom once lost returns not any more,
Hard cores remain:
I will fence round with prudence and secure
A lasting bloom whose freshness shall endure;
Oh, I will guard my peach of youth, be sure,
When I am young again.
When I am young again, I'll spend no breath
On bitter words the heart remembereth
When bitterness is swallowed up by Death
Holding sole reign;
I'll love so well that if they pass to sleep
Before me, I shall have no watch to keep
Over their tears-only my tears to weep
When I am young again.
I will not lightly joy nor idly grieve,
Nor for a heaven itself one soul deceive,
Nor will I be deceived, vainly believe,
Nor love in vain.
Come back, lost youth! Ah, Fate, that one gift give!
Then I will show that I have learned to live;
Youth shall be wise--and two and two make five--
When I am young again!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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