To The Republicans Of North America
I.
Brothers! between you and me
Whirlwinds sweep and billows roar:
Yet in spirit oft I see
On thy wild and winding shore
Freedom’s bloodless banners wave,--
Feel the pulses of the brave
Unextinguished in the grave,--
See them drenched in sacred gore,--
Catch the warrior's gasping breath
Murmuring 'Liberty or death!'
II.
Shout aloud! Let every slave,
Crouching at Corruption's throne,
Start into a man, and brave
Racks and chains without a groan:
And the castle's heartless glow,
And the hovel's vice and woe,
Fade like gaudy flowers that blow--
Weeds that peep, and then are gone
Whilst, from misery's ashes risen,
Love shall burst the captive's prison.
III.
Cotopaxi! bid the sound
Through thy sister mountains ring,
Till each valley smile around
At the blissful welcoming!
And, O thou stern Ocean deep,
Thou whose foamy billows sweep
Shores where thousands wake to weep
Whilst they curse a villain king,
On the winds that fan thy breast
Bear thou news of Freedom's rest!
IV.
Can the daystar dawn of love,
Where the flag of war unfurled
Floats with crimson stain above
The fabric of a ruined world?
Never but to vengeance driven
When the patriot's spirit shriven
Seeks in death its native Heaven!
There, to desolation hurled,
Widowed love may watch thy bier,
Balm thee with its dying tear.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Sabrina
Isle of the ocean, say, whence comest thou?
The smoke thy dark throne, and the blaze round thy brow;
The voice of the earthquake proclaims thee abroad,
And the deep, at thy coming, rolls darkly and loud.
From the breast of the ocean, the bed of the wave,
Thou hast burst into being, hast sprung from the grave;
A stranger, wild, gloomy, yet terribly bright,
Thou art clothed with the darkness, yet crowned with the light.
Thou comest in flames, thou hast risen in fire;
The wave is thy pillow, the tempest thy choir;
They will lull thee to sleep on the ocean's broad breast,
A slumb'ring volcano, an earthquake at rest.
Thou hast looked on the isle — thou hast looked on the wave —
Then hie thee again to thy deep, watery grave;
Go, quench thee in ocean, thou dark, nameless thing,
Thou spark from the fallen one's wide flaming wing.
poem by Lucretia Maria Davidson
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To Ireland
I.
Bear witness, Erin! when thine injured isle
Sees summer on its verdant pastures smile,
Its cornfields waving in the winds that sweep
The billowy surface of thy circling deep!
Thou tree whose shadow o'er the Atlantic gave
Peace, wealth and beauty, to its friendly wave, its blossoms fade,
And blighted are the leaves that cast its shade;
Whilst the cold hand gathers its scanty fruit,
Whose chillness struck a canker to its root.
II.
I could stand
Upon thy shores, O Erin, and could count
The billows that, in their unceasing swell,
Dash on thy beach, and every wave might seem
An instrument in Time the giant's grasp,
To burst the barriers of Eternity.
Proceed, thou giant, conquering and to conquer;
March on thy lonely way! The nations fall
Beneath thy noiseless footstep; pyramids
That for millenniums have defied the blast,
And laughed at lightnings, thou dost crush to nought.
Yon monarch, in his solitary pomp,
Is but the fungus of a winter day
That thy light footstep presses into dust.
Thou art a conqueror, Time; all things give way
Before thee but the 'fixed and virtuous will';
The sacred sympathy of soul which was
When thou wert not, which shall be when thou perishest.
...
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Written At Sea
What is my quarrel with thee, beautiful sea,
That thus I cannot love thy waves or thee,
Or hear thy voice but it tormenteth me?
Why do I hate thee, who art beautiful
Beyond all beauty, when the nights are cool,
And the stars fade because the moon is full?
Why do I hate thee? Thou art new and young,
And life is thine for loving, and thy tongue
Hath tones that I have known and loved and sung.
Thou hast a smile which would my smiling greet;
Thy brave heart beateth as my own doth beat,
And thou hast tears which should be true and sweet.
Thou art a creature, strong and fair and brave,
Such as I might have given the world to have
And love and cherish;--and thou art my slave.
I have my home in thee. Thy arms enfold
Me all night long, and I am rocked and rolled,
And thou art never weary of thy hold.
Thou art a woman in thy constancy,
And worthy better love than mine could be;
And yet, behold, I cannot suffer thee.
If thou wert dumb; if thou wert like the sky,
Which has not learned to speak our misery
In any voice less rude than the wind's cry;
If thou wert wholly young and didst not know
The secret of our ancient human woe,
Or if thou knewest it wholly as I know;
Or yet if thou wert old with all these years;
If thou wert dull to hopes and loves and fears;
If thou wert blind and couldst not see our tears;
If thou wert bounded by some rocky shore,
And hadst not given thyself thus wholly o'er
To our poor single selves with all thy store;
If thou wert not in thy immensity,
A single circle circling with the sky,
Where we must still be centres changelessly;
If thou wert other than thou art; alas,
If thou wert not of water, but a mass
Of formless earth, a waveless plain of grass;
If thou wert shapeless as the mountains are;
If thou wert clad in some discordant wear;
If thou wert not so blue and trim and fair;
If thou wert decked with towns and villages;
If there was heard, across the silent seas,
The music of church bells upon the breeze;
If thou wert this; or if thou wert not near,
But I could only sit apart and hear
The beating of thy waves, and find it drear,
But wild and quite unknown, and far from me;
Sea, if thou couldst no longer be the sea,
Then I could love thee as thou lovest me.
If thou wouldst have me love thee, beautiful sea,
Build up a wall of dark 'twixt thee and me;
Let me not see thee; call the night to thee.
League with the winds; rise up, and send them driven
To roll mad clouds about thy back at even.
Make thee a desolation of the heaven.
Thou shouldst compel me, with thy angry voice,
To choose 'twixt death and thee; and, at the choice,
If my cheek grew not pale, thou might'st rejoice,
And I might love thee, oh thou monstrous sea;
But now I cannot love thy waves or thee,
Or bear thy beauty in my misery.
poem by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
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On The Death Of Rebecca
Thou delicate blossom; thy short race is ended,
Thou sample of virtue and prize of the brave!
No more are thy beauties by mortals attended,
They now are but food for the worms and the grave.
Thou art gone to the tomb, whence there's no returning,
And left us behind in a vale of suspense;
In vain to the dust do we follow thee mourning,
The same doleful trump will soon call us all hence.
I view thee now launched on eternity's ocean,
Thy soul how it smiles as it floats on the wave;
It smiles as if filled with the softest emotion,
But looks not behind on the frowns of the grave.
The messenger came from afar to relieve thee--
In this lonesome valley no more shalt thon roam;
Bright seraphs now stand on the banks to receive thee,
And cry, 'Happy stranger, thou art welcome at home.'
Thou art gone to a feast, while thy friends are bewailing,
Oh, death is a song to the poor ransom'd slave;
Away with bright visions the spirit goes sailing,
And leaves the frail body to rest in the grave.
Rebecca is free from the pains of oppression,
No friends could prevail with her longer to stay;
She smiles on the fields of eternal fruition,
Whilst death like a bridegroom attends her away.
She is gone in the whirlwind--ye seraphs attend her,
Through Jordan's cold torrent her mantle may lave;
She soars in the chariot, and earth falls beneath her,
Resign'd in a shroud to a peaceable grave.
poem by George Moses Horton
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Korner And His Sister
Green wave the oak for ever o'er thy rest,
Thou that beneath its crowning foliage sleepest,
And, in the stillness of thy country's breast,
Thy place of memory, as an altar keepest;
Brightly thy spirit o'er her hills was pour'd,
Thou of the Lyre and Sword!
Rest, bard! rest, soldier! by the father's hand
Here shall the child of after years be led,
With his wreath-offering silently to stand,
In the hush'd presence of the glorious dead.
Soldier and bard! for thou thy path hast trod
With freedom and with God.
The oak wav'd proudly o'er thy burial-rite,
On thy crown'd bier to slumber warriors bore thee,
And with true hearts thy brethren of the fight
Wept as they vail'd their drooping banners o'er thee.
And the deep guns with rolling peal gave token,
That Lyre and Sword were broken.
Thou hast a hero's tomb: a lowlier bed
Is hers, the gentle girl beside thee lying,
The gentle girl, that bow'd her fair, young head
When thou wert gone, in silent sorrow dying.
Brother, true friend! the tender and the brave
She pined to share thy grave.
Fame was thy gift from others; but for her,
To whom the wide world held that only spot,
She loved thee! lovely in your lives ye were,
And in your early deaths divided not.
Thou hast thine oak, thy trophy:–What hath she?
Her own blest place by thee!
It was thy spirit, brother! which had made
The bright earth glorious to her thoughtful eye,
Since first in childhood midst the vines ye play'd,
And sent glad singing thro' the free blue sky.
Ye were but two and when that spirit pass'd,
Wo to the one, the last!
Wo, yet not long! She linger'd but to trace
Thine image from the image in her breast,
Once, once again to see that buried face
But smile upon her, ere she went to rest.
Too sad a smile! its living light was o'er,
It answer'd hers no more.
The earth grew silent when thy voice departed,
The home too lonely whence thy step had fled;
What then was left for her, the faithful-hearted?
Death, death, to still the yearning for the dead!
Softly she perish'd: be the Flower deplor'd
Here with the Lyre and Sword!
Have ye not met ere now? so let those trust
That meet for moments but to part for years,
That weep, watch, pray, to hold back dust from dust,
That love, where love is but a fount of tears.
Brother, sweet sister! peace around ye dwell:
Lyre, Sword, and Flower, farewell!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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A Fisherman's Baby
Oh hush, little baby, thy papa's at sea;
The big billows rock him as mamma rocks thee.
He hastes to his dear ones o'er billows of foam;
Then sleep, little darling, till papa comes home.
Sleep, little baby; hush, little baby;
Papa is coming, no longer to roam.
The shells and the pebbles, all day tossed about,
Are lulled into sleep by the tide ebbing out.
The tired shore slumbers, stretched out in the sand,
While the waves hurry off at mid-ocean's command.
Then hush, little darling; sleep, little darling;
Sleep, baby, rocked by thy mother's own hand.
The winds that have rollicked all day in the west
Are hushed into sleep on the calm evening's breast.
The boats that were out with the wild sea at play
Are now rocked to sleep in the arms of the bay.
Then rest, little baby; sleep, little baby;
Papa will come at the break of the day.
Sleep, little darling; too soon thou wilt be
A man like thy father, to sail o'er the sea.
Then sleep will not come at thy bidding or prayer,
For thou wilt be harassed by danger and care.
Then sleep, little darling; rest, little baby;
Rest whilst thou may, dear, and sleep whilst thou dare.
poem by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
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Fragment: Yes! All Is Past
Yes! all is past--swift time has fled away,
Yet its swell pauses on my sickening mind;
How long will horror nerve this frame of clay?
I’m dead, and lingers yet my soul behind.
Oh! powerful Fate, revoke thy deadly spell,
And yet that may not ever, ever be,
Heaven will not smile upon the work of Hell;
Ah! no, for Heaven cannot smile on me;
Fate, envious Fate, has sealed my wayward destiny.
I sought the cold brink of the midnight surge,
I sighed beneath its wave to hide my woes,
The rising tempest sung a funeral dirge,
And on the blast a frightful yell arose.
Wild flew the meteors o'er the maddened main,
Wilder did grief athwart my bosom glare;
Stilled was the unearthly howling, and a strain,
Swelled mid the tumult of the battling air,
'Twas like a spirit's song, but yet more soft and fair.
I met a maniac—like he was to me,
I said--'Poor victim, wherefore dost thou roam?
And canst thou not contend with agony,
That thus at midnight thou dost quit thine home?'
'Ah there she sleeps: cold is her bloodless form,
And I will go to slumber in her grave;
And then our ghosts, whilst raves the maddened storm,
Will sweep at midnight o’er the wildered wave;
Wilt thou our lowly beds with tears of pity lave?'
'Ah! no, I cannot shed the pitying tear,
This breast is cold, this heart can feel no more--
But I can rest me on thy chilling bier,
Can shriek in horror to the tempest's roar.'
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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To My Husband on Our Wedding-Day
I leave for thee, beloved one,
The home and friends of youth,
Trusting my hopes, my happiness,
Unto thy love and truth;
I leave for thee my girlhood's joys,
Its sunny, careless mirth,
To bear henceforth my share amid
The many cares of earth.
And yet, no wild regret I give
To all that now I leave,
The golden dreams, the flow'ry wreaths
That I no more may weave;
The future that before me lies
A dark and unknown sea --
Whate'er may be its storms or shoals,
I brave them all with thee!
I will not tell thee now of love
Whose life, ere this, thou'st guessed,
And which, like sacred secret, long
Was treasured in my breast;
Enough that if thy lot be calm,
Or storms should o'er it sweep,
Thou'lt learn that it is woman's love,
Unchanging, pure and deep.
If this life's sunshine gild thy lot,
Bestowing wealth and pride,
Its light enjoying, I shall stand,
Rejoicing, at thy side;
But, oh! if thou should'st prove the griefs
That blight thy fellow-men,
'Twill be my highest, dearest right,
To be, love, with thee then.
And thou, wilt thou not promise me
Thy heart will never change,
That tones and looks, so loving now,
Will ne'er grow stern and strange?
That thou'lt be kind, whatever faults
Or failings may be mine,
And bear with them in patient love,
As I will bear with thine?
poem by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon
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Ye Mariners of England
Ye Mariners of England,
That guard our native seas,
Whose flag has braved a thousand years
The battle and the breeze,
Your glorious standard launch again
To match another foe,
And sweep through the deep,
While the stormy winds do blow!
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
The spirits of your fathers
Shall start from every wave,
For the deck it was their field of fame,
And Ocean was their grave.
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell
Your manly hearts shall glow,
As ye sweep through the deep,
While the stormy winds do blow!
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep:
Her march is o'er the mountain-waves,
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak
She quells the floods below
As they roar on the shore,
When the stormy winds do blow!
When the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy winds do blow!
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn,
Till danger's troubled night depart,
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors,
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name,
When the storm has ceased to blow!
When the fiery fight is heard no more,
And the storm has ceased to blow.
poem by Thomas Campbell
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Intrigue
THOU art my love
And thou art the peace of sundown
When the blue shadows soothe
And the grasses and the leaves sleep
To the song of the little brooks
Woe is me.
Thou art my love,
And thou art a storm
That breaks black in the sky
And, sweeping headlong,
Drenches and cowers each tree
And at the panting end
There is no sound
Save the melancholy cry of a single owl
Woe is me!
Thou art my love
And thou art a tinsel thing
And I in my play
Broke thee easily
And from the little fragments
Arose my long sorrow
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art a weary violet
Drooping from sun-caresses.
Answering mine carelessly
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art the ashes of other men's love
And I bury my face in these ashes
And I love them
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art the beard
On another man's face
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art a temple
And in this temple is an altar
And on this altar is my heart
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art a wretch.
Let these sacred love-lies choke thee
For I am come to where I know your lies as truth
And your truth as lies
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art a priestess
And in thy hand is a bloody dagger
And my doom comes to me surely
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art a skull with ruby eyes
And I love thee
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And I doubt thee
And if peace came with my murder
Then would I murder
Woe is me.
Thou art my love
And thou art death
Aye, thou art death
Black and yet black
But I love thee
I love thee
Woe, welcome woe, to me.
poem by Stephen Crane
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On Leaving London For Wales
Hail to thee, Cambria! for the unfettered wind
Which from thy wilds even now methinks I feel,
Chasing the clouds that roll in wrath behind,
And tightening the soul's laxest nerves to steel;
True mountain Liberty alone may heal
The pain which Custom's obduracies bring,
And he who dares in fancy even to steal
One draught from Snowdon's ever sacred spring
Blots out the unholiest rede of worldly witnessing.
And shall that soul, to selfish peace resigned,
So soon forget the woe its fellows share?
Can Snowdon's Lethe from the free-born mind
So soon the page of injured penury tear?
Does this fine mass of human passion dare
To sleep, unhonouring the patriot’s fall,
Or life’s sweet load in quietude to bear
While millions famish even in Luxury’s hall,
And Tyranny, high raised, stern lowers on all?
No, Cambria! never may thy matchless vales
A heart so false to hope and virtue shield;
Nor ever may thy spirit-breathing gales
Waft freshness to the slaves who dare to yield.
For me!...the weapon that I burn to wield
I seek amid thy rocks to ruin hurled,
That Reason’s flag may over Freedom’s field,
Symbol of bloodless victory, wave unfurled,
A meteor-sign of love effulgent o’er the world.
...
Do thou, wild Cambria, calm each struggling thought;
Cast thy sweet veil of rocks and woods between,
That by the soul to indignation wrought
Mountains and dells be mingled with the scene;
Let me forever be what I have been,
But not forever at my needy door
Let Misery linger speechless, pale and lean;
I am the friend of the unfriended poor,--
Let me not madly stain their righteous cause in gore.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Sonnet to Ocean
Shall I rebuke thee, Ocean, my old love,
That once, in rage, with the wild winds at strife,
Thou darest menace my unit of a life,
Sending my clay below, my soul above,
Whilst roar'd thy waves, like lions when they rove
By night, and bound upon their prey by stealth!
Yet didst thou n'er restore my fainting health?—
Didst thou ne'er murmur gently like the dove?
Nay, dost thou not against my own dear shore
Full break, last link between my land and me?—
My absent friends talk in thy very roar,
In thy waves' beat their kindly pulse I see,
And, if I must not see my England more,
Next to her soil, my grave be found in thee!
poem by Thomas Hood
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The Soldier's Grave
Breathe not a whisper here;
The place where thou dost stand is hallowed ground;
In silence gather near this upheaved mound -
Around the soldier's bier.
Here Liberty may weep,
And Freedom pause in her unchecked career,
To pay the sacred tribute of a tear
O'er the pale warrior's sleep.
That arm now cold in death,
But late on glory's field triumphant bore
Our country's flag; that marble brow once bore
The victor's fadeless wreath.
Rest soldier, sweetly rest;
Affection's gentle hand shall deck thy tomb
With flowers and chaplets of unfading bloom
Be laid upon thy breast.
poem by Anonymous Americas
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To Isa in Heaven
Early, bright, transient, chaste as morning dew,
She sparkled, was exhaled, and went to heaven! — Young.
Where is she now?
Oh! Isa! tell me where thou art?
If death has laid his hand upon thy brow,
Has he not touched my heart?
Has he not laid it in the grave with thine,
And buried all my joys?—Speak! thou art mine!
If thou were dead,
I would not ask thee to reply;
But thou art living—thy dear soul has fled
To heaven, where it can never die!
Then why not come to me? Return—return
And comfort me, for I have much to mourn!
I sigh all day!
I mourn for thee the livelong night!
And when the next night comes, thou art away,
And so is absent my delight!
Oh! as the lone dove for his absent mate,
So is my soul for thee disconsolate!
I long for death—
For any thing—to be with thee!
I did inhale, alas! thy dying breath,
That it might have some power on me
To make me what thou art!—but, thou art dead!
And I am here!—it strengthened me instead!
Joy there is none—
It went into the grave with thee!
And grief, because my spirit is alone,
Is all that comes to comfort me!
The very air I breathe is turned to sighs,
And all mine soul is melting from mine eyes!
I hear, at even,
The liquid carol of birds;
Their music makes me think of thee in heaven,
It is so much like thy sweet words.
The brooklet whispers, as it runs along,
Our first love-story with its liquid tongue.
Wake, Isa! wake!
And come back in this world again!
Oh! come down to me, for my soul's dear sake,
And cure me of this trying pain!
I would give all that earth to man can be,
If thou wert only in this world with me!
Day after day
I seek thee, but thou art not near!
I sit down on thy grave in the cold clay,
And listen for thy soul!—oh! dear!
And when some withered leaf falls from the tree,
I start as if thy soul had spoke to me!
And so it is,
And so it ever more must ever be
To him, who has been robbed of all the bliss
He ever knew, by loving thee!
For misery, in thine absence, is my wife!
What joy had been, hadst thou remained in life!
It is now even;
The birds have sung themselves to sleep;
And all the stars seem coming out of heaven,
As if to look upon me weep!—
Oh! let me not look up to thee in vain,
But come back to me in this world again!
poem by Thomas Holley Chivers (1842)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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To William Shelley
I.
The billows on the beach are leaping around it,
The bark is weak and frail,
The sea looks black, and the clouds that bound it
Darkly strew the gale.
Come with me, thou delightful child,
Come with me, though the wave is wild,
And the winds are loose, we must not stay,
Or the slaves of the law may rend thee away.
II.
They have taken thy brother and sister dear,
They have made them unfit for thee;
They have withered the smile and dried the tear
Which should have been sacred to me.
To a blighting faith and a cause of crime
They have bound them slaves in youthly prime,
And they will curse my name and thee
Because we fearless are and free.
III.
Come thou, beloved as thou art;
Another sleepeth still
Near thy sweet mother’s anxious heart,
Which thou with joy shalt fill,
With fairest smiles of wonder thrown
On that which is indeed our own,
And which in distant lands will be
The dearest playmate unto thee.
IV.
Fear not the tyrants will rule for ever,
Or the priests of the evil faith;
They stand on the brink of that raging river,
Whose waves they have tainted with death.
It is fed from the depth of a thousand dells,
Around them it foams and rages and swells;
And their swords and their sceptres I floating see,
Like wrecks on the surge of eternity.
V.
Rest, rest, and shriek not, thou gentle child!
The rocking of the boat thou fearest,
And the cold spray and the clamour wild?--
There, sit between us two, thou dearest--
Me and thy mother--well we know
The storm at which thou tremblest so,
With all its dark and hungry graves,
Less cruel than the savage slaves
Who hunt us o’er these sheltering waves.
VI.
This hour will in thy memory
Be a dream of days forgotten long.
We soon shall dwell by the azure sea
Of serene and golden Italy,
Or Greece, the Mother of the free;
And I will teach thine infant tongue
To call upon those heroes old
In their own language, and will mould
Thy growing spirit in the flame
Of Grecian lore, that by such name
A patriot’s birthright thou mayst claim!
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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To Death
Death! where is thy victory?
To triumph whilst I die,
To triumph whilst thine ebon wing
Enfolds my shuddering soul?
O Death! where is thy sting?
Not when the tides of murder roll,
When nations groan, that kings may bask in bliss,
Death! canst thou boast a victory such as this--
When in his hour of pomp and power
His blow the mightiest murderer gave,
Mid Nature’s cries the sacrifice
Of millions to glut the grave;
When sunk the Tyrant Desolation’s slave;
Or Freedom’s life-blood streamed upon thy shrine;
Stern Tyrant, couldst thou boast a victory such as mine?
To know in dissolution’s void
That mortals’ baubles sunk decay;
That everything, but Love, destroyed
Must perish with its kindred clay,--
Perish Ambition’s crown,
Perish her sceptred sway:
From Death’s pale front fades Pride’s fastidious frown.
In Death’s damp vault the lurid fires decay,
That Envy lights at heaven-born Virtue’s beam--
That all the cares subside,
Which lurk beneath the tide
Of life’s unquiet stream;--
Yes! this is victory!
And on yon rock, whose dark form glooms the sky,
To stretch these pale limbs, when the soul is fled;
To baffle the lean passions of their prey,
To sleep within the palace of the dead!
Oh! not the King, around whose dazzling throne
His countless courtiers mock the words they say,
Triumphs amid the bud of glory blown,
As I in this cold bed, and faint expiring groan!
Tremble, ye proud, whose grandeur mocks the woe
Which props the column of unnatural state!
You the plainings, faint and low,
From Misery’s tortured soul that flow,
Shall usher to your fate.
Tremble, ye conquerors, at whose fell command
The war-fiend riots o’er a peaceful land!
You Desolation’s gory throng
Shall bear from Victory along
To that mysterious strand.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The Sunbeam
Thou art no lingerer in monarch's hall,
A joy thou art, and a wealth to all!
A bearer of hope unto land and sea“
Sunbeam! what gift hath the world like thee?
Thou art walking the billows, and ocean smiles;
Thou hast touch'd with glory his thousand isles;
Thou hast lit up the ships, and the feathery foam,
And gladden'd the sailor, like words from home.
To the solemn depths of the forest shades,
Thou art streaming on thro' their green arcades,
And the quivering leaves that have caught thy glow,
Like fire-flies glance to the pools below.
I look'd on the mountains,“a vapour lay
Folding their heights in its dark array:
Thou brakest forth,“and the mist became
A crown and a mantle of living flame.
I look'd on the peasant's lowly cot,“
Something of sadness had wrapt the spot;“
But a gleam of thee on its lattice fell,
And it laugh'd into beauty at that bright spell.
To the earth's wild places a guest thou art,
Flushing the waste like the rose's heart;
And thou scornest not from thy pomp to shed
A tender smile on the ruin's head.
Thou tak'st thro' the dim church-aisle thy way,
And its pillars from twilight flash forth to day,
And its high, pale tombs, with their trophies old,
Are bath'd in a flood as of molten gold.
And thou turnest not from the humblest grave,
Where a flower to the sighing winds may wave;
Thou scatterest its gloom like the dreams of rest,
Thou sleepest in love on its grassy breast.
Sunbeam of summer! oh! what is like thee?
Hope of the wilderness, joy of the sea!“
One thing is like thee to mortals given,
The faith touching all things with hues of Heaven!
poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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His Indian Love to Diogo Alvarez
ON HIS DEPARTURE FROM BAHIA
When thou stoodst amidst thy countrymen
Our captive and our foe,
What voice of pity was it then
That check'd the fatal blow?
When the name of the mighty 'Man of Fire'
Re-echoed to the sky,
And our chiefs forgot their deadly ire—
Who hail'd thy victory?
What voice like the softest, sweetest note
That rings from the slender white bird's throat,
Has soothed thee so oft to rest?
And thou hast said, so tenderly,
That to sit among willow isles with me
Was to be ever blest!
Oh! have we not wander'd in silent night
When the thick dews fell from the weeping bough;
And then these eyes, like the stars, were bright—
But are wet like those mournful branches now.
Like the leafless plant that twines around
The forest tree so fair and high,
And when in that withering clasp 'tis bound,
Leaves the blighted trunk to die,—
Thy vows round my trusting heart have bound,
And now thou leav'st me to misery!
Thou wilt not return—thy words are vain!
Thou wilt cross the deep blue sea;
And some dark-eyed maid of thy native Spain
Will hold thee far from me.
The summer will come, and our willow shore
Will hear the merman sing;
But thou wilt list to his song no more
When the rocks with his music ring:
He will murmur thy falsehood to every cave—
Or will tell of thy death on the stormy wave.
Ah! no; ah! no; 'tis of mine he'll tell—
I will weep no more—farewell!—farewell!
Look from thy bark, how I follow afar;
How I scorn the winds' and the billows' war;—
I sink! the waves ring loudly my knell;
My sorrows are passing—farewell!—farewell!
poem by Louisa Stuart Costello
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Emily Bronte
'Du hast Diamanten'
Thou hadst all Passion's splendor,
Thou hadst abounding store
Of heaven's eternal jewels,
Beloved; what wouldst thou more?
Thine was the frolic freedom
Of creatures coy and wild,
The melancholy of wisdom,
The innocence of a child,
The maiPd will of the warrior,
That buckled in thy breast
Humility as of Francis,
The Self-surrender of Christ;
And of God's cup thou drankest
The unmingled wine of Love,
Which makes poor mortals giddy
When they but sip thereof.
What was't to thee thy pathway
So rugged mean and hard,
Whereon when Death surprised thee
Thou gavest him no regard?
What was't to thee, enamour'd
As a red rose of the sun,
If of thy myriad lovers
Thou never sawest one?
Nor if of all thy lovers
That are and were to be
None ever had their vision,
O my belov'd, of thee,
Until thy silent glory
Went forth from earth alone,
Where like a star thou gleamest
From thine immortal throne.
poem by Robert Seymour Bridges
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War
Ambition, power, and avarice, now have hurled
Death, fate, and ruin, on a bleeding world.
See! on yon heath what countless victims lie,
Hark! what loud shrieks ascend through yonder sky;
Tell then the cause, 'tis sure the avenger's rage
Has swept these myriads from life's crowded stage:
Hark to that groan, an anguished hero dies,
He shudders in death’s latest agonies;
Yet does a fleeting hectic flush his cheek,
Yet does his parting breath essay to speak--
'Oh God! my wife, my children--Monarch thou
For whose support this fainting frame lies low;
For whose support in distant lands I bleed,
Let his friends' welfare be the warrior's meed.
He hears me not—ah! no—kings cannot hear,
For passion's voice has dulled their listless ear.
To thee, then, mighty God, I lift my moan,
Thou wilt not scorn a suppliant's anguished groan.
Oh! now I die--but still is death's fierce pain--
God hears my prayer--we meet, we meet again.'
He spake, reclined him on death's bloody bed,
And with a parting groan his spirit fled.
Oppressors of mankind to YOU we owe
The baleful streams from whence these miseries flow;
For you how many a mother weeps her son,
Snatched from life's course ere half his race was run!
For you how many a widow drops a tear,
In silent anguish, on her husband's bier!
'Is it then Thine, Almighty Power,' she cries,
'Whence tears of endless sorrow dim these eyes?
Is this the system which Thy powerful sway,
Which else in shapeless chaos sleeping lay,
Formed and approved?--it cannot be--but oh!
Forgive me, Heaven, my brain is warped by woe.'
'Tis not--He never bade the war-note swell,
He never triumphed in the work of hell--
Monarchs of earth! thine is the baleful deed,
Thine are the crimes for which thy subjects bleed.
Ah! when will come the sacred fated time,
When man unsullied by his leaders' crime,
Despising wealth, ambition, pomp, and pride,
Will stretch him fearless by his foe-men's side?
Ah! when will come the time, when o'er the plain
No more shall death and desolation reign?
When will the sun smile on the bloodless field,
And the stern warrior's arm the sickle wield?
Not whilst some King, in cold ambition's dreams,
Plans for the field of death his plodding schemes;
Not whilst for private pique the public fall,
And one frail mortal's mandate governs all.
Swelled with command and mad with dizzying sway;
Who sees unmoved his myriads fade away.
Careless who lives or dies--so that he gains
Some trivial point for which he took the pains.
What then are Kings?--I see the trembling crowd,
I hear their fulsome clamours echoed loud;
Their stern oppressor pleased appears awhile,
But April's sunshine is a Monarch’s smile--
Kings are but dust--the last eventful day
Will level all and make them lose their sway;
Will dash the sceptre from the Monarch’s hand,
And from the warrior’s grasp wrest the ensanguined brand.
Oh! Peace, soft Peace, art thou for ever gone,
Is thy fair form indeed for ever flown?
And love and concord hast thou swept away,
As if incongruous with thy parted sway?
Alas, I fear thou hast, for none appear.
Now o'er the palsied earth stalks giant Fear,
With War, and Woe, and Terror, in his train;--
List'ning he pauses on the embattled plain,
Then speeding swiftly o'er the ensanguined heath,
Has left the frightful work to Hell and Death.
See! gory Ruin yokes his blood-stained car,
He scents the battle's carnage from afar;
Hell and Destruction mark his mad career,
He tracks the rapid step of hurrying Fear;
Whilst ruined towns and smoking cities tell,
That thy work, Monarch, is the work of Hell.
'It is thy work!' I hear a voice repeat,
Shakes the broad basis of thy bloodstained seat;
And at the orphan’s sigh, the widow's moan,
Totters the fabric of thy guilt-stained throne--
'It is thy work, O Monarch;' now the sound
Fainter and fainter, yet is borne around,
Yet to enthusiast ears the murmurs tell
That Heaven, indignant at the work of Hell,
Will soon the cause, the hated cause remove,
Which tears from earth peace, innocence, and love.
poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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