Lyrics by John B Tabb 
 
 IB
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 
 SAN DIEGO
 
 16163:
 
 LYRICS BY JOHN B. TABB
 
 First edition (five hundred copies) March, 1897 
 Second edition (five hundred copies) March, 1897 
 Third edition (five hundred copies) April, 1897 
 Fourth edition (five hundred copies) October, 1897 
 Printed by John Wilson & Son Cambridge, U.S.A.
 
 Lyrics by 
 John B Tabb 
 
 Boston Copelond and Day 
 
 London John Lane 
 
 MDCCCXCVII
 
 ENTERED ACCORDING TO THE ACT 
 OF CONGRESS, IN THE YEAR 1897, 
 BY COPELAND AND DAY, IN THE 
 OFFICE OF THE LIBRARIAN OF CON- 
 GRESS AT WASHINGTON.
 
 TO THE MEMORY OF MT MOTHER. 
 
 COWSLIP. 
 
 /T brings my mother back to me, 
 Thy frail, familiar form to see, 
 
 Which was her homely joy , 
 And strange, that one so weak as thou, 
 Shouldst lift the <veil that sunders now 
 The mother and the boy.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHERRY BLOOM PAGE I 
 
 DAWN 2 
 
 ECHO 3 
 
 MORNING AND NIGHT BLOOM 4 
 EXALTATION 
 
 HAZARD 6 
 
 THE YOUNG TENOR 7 
 FRATERNITY 
 
 MY MESSMATE 9 
 
 "VOX CLAMANTIS" IO 
 
 NIAGARA 1J 
 
 THE BRIDGE * 2 
 
 THE STATUE J 4 
 
 THE SEED 15 
 
 THE TREE *6 
 
 THE SISTERS 1 7 
 
 THE GOSSIP I 8 
 
 THE TOLLMEN 19 
 
 THE PINE-TREE 2O 
 
 TRANSFIGURED 21 
 
 ANONYMOUS 22 
 
 MIDNIGHT 23 
 
 INSOMNIA 24 
 
 PAIN 25 
 
 SYMPATHY 26
 
 MEMORY PAGE 27 
 
 LIVERY 28 
 
 SLUMBER-SONG 29 
 
 THE SUPPLIANT 30 
 
 RELEASED 31 
 
 WRECKED 32 
 
 GONE 33 
 
 AGAINST THE SKY 34 
 
 ILLUSION 35 
 
 SUNSET AT SEA 36 
 
 INTERPRETED 37 
 
 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS 38 
 
 OFF SAN SALVADOR 39 
 
 A SIGH OF THE SEA 40 
 
 SHELL-TINTS 4 2 
 
 THE LOST ANCHOR 43 
 
 THE SEA-BUBBLE 44 
 
 DE PROFUNDIS 
 
 ALTER IDEM 
 
 FROM PARADISE 
 
 SELECTION 
 
 MAIDEN BLOOM 
 
 THE RAIN AND THE DEW 
 
 THE SHOWER 
 
 RESIGNATION 
 
 THE SLEEPING BEAUTY 
 
 CLEOPATRA TO THE ASP 
 
 Vi
 
 ADIEU PAGB 55 
 
 ASLEEP 56 
 
 IN SOLITUDE 57 
 
 UNHEEDED ^g 
 
 ALL IN ALL 59 
 
 THE DEWS 60 
 
 THE LIFE-TIDE 6 1 
 
 ONSET 62 
 
 TO A BLIND BABE, SLEEPING 63 
 
 FORESHADOWED 64 
 
 SUSPENSE 65 
 
 IMMORTALITY 66 
 
 SECURITY 67 
 
 PILGRIMS 68 
 
 IN THE DEATH CHAMBER 69 
 
 THE DEPARTED 
 
 THE FOUNDLING 
 
 RETROSPECT 
 
 REFLECTION 
 
 COMMUNION 
 
 TRANSFIGURATION 
 
 BREAD 
 
 SAND 
 
 BEACON LIGHTS 
 
 70 
 
 71 
 7 2 
 
 73 
 74 
 75 
 76 
 77 
 
 THE MARSH 78 
 
 79 
 
 OUTSPEEDED . go 
 
 THE SIREN STREAM TO THE OUTCAST 8 1 
 
 vii
 
 AT LAST PAGE 82 
 
 THE PILGRIM 83 
 
 MY GUIDE 84 
 
 GIUL10 86 
 
 BETRAYED 88 
 
 THE FIRST SNOW-FALL 89 
 
 AN INTERVIEW 
 
 ANTICIPATION 
 
 THE TRYST OF SPRING 
 
 ONE APRIL MORN 
 
 AN APRIL PRAYER 
 
 AN AUTUMN LEAF 
 
 MATER DOLOROSA 
 
 INDIAN SUMMER 
 
 OCTOBER 
 
 FROM THE UNDERGROUND 
 
 THE SNOWDROP 
 
 WIND-FLOWERS 
 
 AN APRIL BLOOM 
 
 PEACH BLOOM 
 
 MIGNONETTE 
 
 CLOVER 
 
 IMMORTELLES 
 
 SONG OF THE MORNING-GLORIES 
 
 " CONSIDER THE LILIES " 
 
 TO A WOOD-VIOLET 
 
 A LOTUS BLOOM 
 
 viii
 
 A RUBRIC 
 
 PAGE III 
 
 THE SNOW-BIRD 
 
 112 
 
 TO THE WOOD-ROBIN 
 
 113 
 
 THE DEAD THRUSH 
 
 "5 
 
 CHRISTMAS 
 
 116 
 
 THE LAMB-CHILD 
 
 117 
 
 THE ANGEL'S CHRISTMAS QUEST 
 
 118 
 
 RESTRAINT 
 
 119 
 
 GLORIA IN EXCELSIS 
 
 120 
 
 ON CALVARY 
 
 121 
 
 TO THE CRUCIFIX 
 
 122 
 
 STAB AT MATER 
 
 123 
 
 EASTER EVE 
 
 124 
 
 EASTER MORNING 
 
 I2 5 
 
 EASTER FLOWERS 
 
 126 
 
 GOD 
 
 127 
 
 TENEBR^ 
 
 128 
 
 DEUS ABSCONDITUS 
 
 129 
 
 GOD'S LIKENESS 
 
 130 
 
 MY MEDIATOR 
 
 131 
 
 THE SONG OF THE MAN 
 
 132 
 
 CHARITY 
 
 133 
 
 FULFILMENT 
 
 134 
 
 ON SEA AND LAND 
 
 J 35 
 
 STILLING THE TEMPEST 
 
 136 
 
 THE POSTULANT 
 
 i37 
 
 PURGATORY 
 
 138
 
 BETTER PAGB ,39 
 
 LONE-LAND 
 
 QUATRAINS. 
 
 WOMAN 
 OPPORTUNITY 
 
 140 
 
 143 
 144 
 
 LIFE 
 
 DEATH j^g 
 
 RELEASE I47 
 
 LIGHT jxg 
 
 IN DARKNESS ! 49 
 
 SILENCE I50 
 
 FANCY j.j 
 
 FAME j 5a 
 
 TIME'S LEGACY I53 
 
 A CRISIS , 54 
 
 THE CYNOSURE ! 55 
 
 RESISTANCE ! 5 6 
 
 THE BILLOWS J 57 
 
 THE VOYAGER I^g 
 
 ADRIFT I 59 
 
 DEEP UNTO DEEP ! 60 
 
 VESTIGES ,6! 
 
 THE MID-DAY MOON ! 6a 
 
 TO AN EVENING SHADE 163 
 
 HEROES ,6^ 
 
 LANIER'S FLUTE i6c
 
 POE-CHOPIN PAGE I 66 
 
 TO AN EXILE 167 
 
 TO A DYING BABE 1 68 
 
 MY SECRET 169 
 
 IN ABSENCE I 7 O 
 
 A REMONSTRANCE 17! 
 
 NEW AND OLD I 7 2 
 
 THE FIG-TREE 173 
 
 THE BEE AND THE BLOSSOMS 174 
 
 BONE-CASTANETS 175 
 
 SONNETS. 
 
 DAYBREAK 179 
 
 FORECAST 1 80 
 
 TO AN IDOL l8l 
 
 KEDRON 182 
 
 THE DRUID 183 
 
 THE HERMIT 184 
 
 POE 185 
 
 SHELLEY 1 86 
 
 AT KEATS'S GRAVE 187
 
 CHERRY BLOOM. 
 
 FRAILEST, and first to stand 
 
 the border-land 
 3 From darkness shriven, 
 S?In livery of Death 
 Thou utterest the breath 
 And light of Heaven. 
 
 Tho' profitless thou seem 
 As doth a Poet's dream, 
 
 Apart from thee 
 Nor limb nor laboring root 
 May load with ripened fruit 
 
 The parent tree.
 
 DAWN. 
 
 BEHOLD, as from a silver horn, 
 The sacerdotal Night 
 Outpours upon his latest-born 
 The chrism of the light ; 
 And bids him to the altar come, 
 
 Whereon for sacrifice, 
 (A lamb before his shearers, dumb,) 
 A victim shadow lies.
 
 ECHO. 
 
 O FAMISHED Prodigal, in vain 
 Thy portion spent thou seek'st again 
 
 Thy father's doorj 
 His all with latest sigh bequeathed 
 To thee the wanderer he breathed, 
 Alas ! no more.
 
 MORNING AND NIGHT BLOOM. 
 
 A STAR and a rosebud white, 
 In the morning twilight gray, 
 The latest blossom of the night, 
 
 The earliest of the day j 
 The star to vanish in the light, 
 The rose to stay. 
 
 A star and a rosebud white, 
 
 In the evening twilight gray, 
 The earliest blossom of the night, 
 
 The latest of the day ; 
 The one in darkness finding light, 
 
 One, lost for aye.
 
 EXALTATION. 
 
 OLEAF upon the highest bough, 
 The Poet of the woods art thou 
 To whom alone 't is given 
 The farthest from thy place of birth 
 To hold communion with the earth, 
 Nor lose the light of Heaven. 
 
 O leaf upon the topmost height, 
 Amid thy heritage of light 
 
 Unsheltered by a shade, 
 *Tis thine the loneliness to know 
 That leans for sympathy below, 
 
 Nor finds what it hath made.
 
 HAZARD. 
 
 ONE step 'twixt loss and gain ! 
 The summit to attain 
 So near the brink of Pain 
 Hath joy to go 
 
 So steep the precipice, 
 So frail the footing is, 
 'T were death to panting Bliss 
 To look below.
 
 THE YOUNG TENOR. 
 
 I WOKE ; the harbored melody 
 Had crossed the slumber bar, 
 And out upon the open sea 
 
 Of consciousness, afar 
 Swept onward with a fainter strain, 
 As echoing the dream again. 
 
 So soft the silver sound, and clear, 
 Outpoured upon the night, 
 
 That Silence seemed a listener 
 O'erleaning with delight 
 
 The slender moon, a finger-tip 
 
 Upon the portal of her lip.
 
 FRATERNITY. 
 
 I KNOW not but in every leaf 
 That sprang to life along with me, 
 Were written all the joy and grief 
 Thenceforth my fate to be. 
 
 The wind that whispered to the earth, 
 The bird that sang its earliest lay, 
 
 The flower that blossomed at my birth, 
 My kinsmen all were they. 
 
 Ay, but for fellowship with these 
 
 I had not been nay, might not be j 
 
 Nor they but vagrant melodies 
 Till harmonized to me.
 
 MY MESSMATE. 
 
 WHY fear thee, brother Death, 
 That sharest, breath by breath, 
 This brimming life of mine ? 
 Each draught that I resign 
 Into thy chalice flows. 
 Comrades of old are we $ 
 All that the Present knows 
 Is but a shade of me : 
 My Self to thee alone 
 And to the Past is known. 
 
 9
 
 "VOX CLAMANTIS." 
 
 OSEA, forever calling to the shore 
 With menace or caress, 
 A voice like his unheeded that of yore 
 
 Cried in the wilderness ; 
 A deep forever yearning unto deep, 
 For silence out of sound, 
 Thy restlessness the cradle of a sleep 
 That thou hast never found.
 
 NIAGARA. 
 
 WHERE echo ne'er hath found 
 A footing on the steep, 
 Descends, without a sound, 
 The cataract of sleep. 
 
 Like swallows in the spray, 
 
 When evening is near, 
 The thronging thoughts of day 
 
 About the brink appear ; 
 
 Till greets a heaven below 
 
 A sister heaven above, 
 Alike with stars aglow 
 
 Of unextinguished love.
 
 THE BRIDGE. 
 
 WHERE, as a lordly dream, 
 Glides the deep-winding stream 
 For evermore $ 
 
 Calm, as in conscious strength, 
 Bends thy majestic length, 
 From shore to shore. 
 
 Life, in its fevered heat, 
 Surges, with pulsing feet, 
 
 Restless, above ; 
 Doomed, in its anxious flow, 
 Like the strong tide below, 
 
 Onward to move. 
 
 Strange is the motley throng ! 
 Hearts yet untaught of wrong, 
 
 Thoughtless of pain, 
 Mingle with souls accursM, 
 Sands in a desert thirst 
 
 Clouds without rain. 
 
 While o'er thee and below 
 Swift the twin currents flow, 
 
 Thy form serene, 
 Still as the shades that sleep 
 On the reflecting deep 
 
 Arches between.
 
 O that, all strife above, 
 Strong in the strength thereof 
 
 Man evermore 
 Built, with a broader span, 
 Love for his fellow-man 
 
 From shore to shore !
 
 THE STATUE. 
 
 THIRST fashioned in the artist's brain, 
 
 r It stood as in the marble vein, 
 
 Revealed to him alone ; 
 Nor could he from its native night 
 Have led it to the living light, 
 
 Save through the lifeless stone. 
 
 E'en so, of Silence and of Sound 
 A twin-born mystery is found, 
 
 Like as of death and birth ; 
 Without the pause we had not heard 
 The harmony, nor caught the word 
 
 That Heaven reveals to Earth.
 
 THE SEED. 
 
 BEARING a life unseen, 
 Thou lingerest between 
 A flower withdrawn, 
 And what thou ne'er shalt see- 
 A blossom yet to be 
 When thou art gone. 
 
 Unto the feast of Spring 
 Thy broken heart shall bring 
 
 What most it craved, 
 To find, like Magdalen 
 In tears, a life again 
 
 Love-lost and saved !
 
 THE TREE. 
 
 PLANTED by the Master's hand 
 Steadfast in thy place to stand, 
 While the ever-changing year 
 Clothes, or strips thy branches bare 5 
 Lending not a leaf to hold 
 Warmth against the winter's cold ; 
 Lightening not a limb the less 
 For the summer's sultriness ; 
 Nay, thy burden heavier made, 
 That within thy bending shade 
 Thankless multitudes, oppressed, 
 There may lay them down and rest. 
 Soul, upon thy Calvary 
 Wait j the Christ will come to thee. 
 
 16
 
 THE SISTERS. 
 
 THE waves forever move } 
 The hills forever rest : 
 Yet each the heavens approve, 
 And Love alike hath blessed 
 A Martha's household care, 
 A Mary's cloistered prayer.
 
 THE GOSSIP. 
 
 SO near me dwells my neighbor Death 
 That e'en what Silence pondereth 
 He catches word for word, 
 And promises, some future day, 
 To visit me upon his way, 
 And tell what he has heard. 
 
 18
 
 THE TOLLMEN. 
 
 LO, Silence, Sleep, and Death 
 Await us on the way, 
 To take of each the tribute breath 
 That God himself did pay. 
 
 Nor Solomon's as great, 
 Nor Caesar's strong control, 
 As his who sits beside his gate 
 To take of each the toll.
 
 THE PINE-TREE. 
 
 WITH whispers of futurity 
 And echoes of the past, 
 Twin birds a shelter find in thee 
 
 Against the wintry blast, 
 The fledgling Hope, that preens her wing, 
 
 Too timorous to fly, 
 And Memory, that comes to sing 
 Her coranach, and die.
 
 TRANSFIGURED. 
 
 nTHROUGHOUT the livelong summer day 
 JL The Leaf and twlnborn Shadow play 
 
 Till Leaf to Shadow fade ; 
 Then, hidden for a season brief, 
 They dream, till Shadow turn to Leaf 
 
 As Leaf was turned to Shade.
 
 ANONYMOUS. 
 
 A NON YMOUS nor needs a name 
 /~\To tell the secret whence the flame, 
 With light, and warmth, and incense, came 
 A new creation to proclaim. 
 
 So was it when, His labor done, 
 
 God saw His work, and smiled thereon : 
 
 His glory in the picture shone, 
 
 But name upon the canvas, none.
 
 MIDNIGHT. 
 
 A FLOOD of darkness overwhelms the land 5 
 And all that God had planned, 
 Of loveliness beneath the noonday skies, 
 A dream overshadowed lies. 
 
 Amid the universal darkness deep, 
 Only the Isles of Sleep, 
 As did the dwellings of the Israelite 
 In Egypt, stem the night.
 
 INSOMNIA. 
 
 E'EN this, Lord, didst thou bless 
 This pain of sleeplessness 
 
 The livelong night, 
 
 Urging God's gentlest angel from thy side, 
 That anguish only might with thee abide 
 
 Until the light. 
 Yea, e'en the last and best, 
 Thy victory and rest, 
 
 Came thus to thee ; 
 
 For 'twas while others calmly slept around, 
 That thou alone in sleeplessness wast found, 
 
 To comfort me.
 
 PAIN. 
 
 I AM a gardener to weed 
 And dig about the heart: 
 To plant therein the pregnant seed, 
 And watch, with many a smart, 
 The stem and leaf and blossom rise, 
 
 Alternate to supply 
 The victims for the sacrifice, 
 And, for the fruit, to die.
 
 SYMPATHY. 
 
 LO ! of gladness or regret 
 Teardrops in the violet 
 Weeping till her leaves are wet, 
 Dewdrops in mine eyes beget ! 
 
 Mirrored in each lucid sphere } 
 Highest heaven to earth is near ; 
 Closer sympathies are here 
 'Twixt the dewdrop and the tear. 
 
 26
 
 MEMORY. 
 
 LO, the Blossom to the Bee 
 Yields not more than thou to me - 
 Food for Love to live upon 
 When the summer days are gone, 
 Poorer than they came, to find 
 What was sweetest, left behind.
 
 LIVERY. 
 
 OLD-FASHIONED raiment suits the Tree : 
 Tho' flouting winds are fain 
 To strip the foliage, presently 
 
 He pattern's it again j 
 Fastidious of chivalry, 
 Rejecting as in scorn 
 All other than the panoply 
 His ancestors have worn. 
 
 28
 
 SLUMBER-SONG. 
 
 SLEEP ! the spirits that attend 
 On thy waking hours are fled. 
 Heaven thou canst not now offend 
 
 Till thy slumber-plumes are shed j 
 Consciousness alone doth lend 
 
 Life its pain, and Death its dread j 
 Innocence and Peace befriend 
 All the sleeping and the dead. 
 
 29
 
 THE SUPPLIANT; 
 
 S~^ DEWDROP, lay thy finger-tip 
 V_yOf moisture on my fevered lip," 
 The noonday Blossom cries. 
 
 " Alas, O Dives, dark and deep 
 
 The gulf impassable of Sleep 
 Henceforth between us lies ! "
 
 RELEASED. 
 
 GO, bird, and to the sky 
 Pour forth what thou and I 
 Have suffered here: 
 Thou, for thy mate removed, 
 And I, for faith disproved 
 In one as dear. 
 
 Farewell; and if again 
 Thou find for prison-pain 
 
 Felicity, 
 
 Be this thy glad release 
 A prophecy of peace, 
 
 Dear bird, for me!
 
 WRECKED. 
 
 DEEP in the forest glades, 
 Where leafy welcomes wooed our wandering way, 
 Once blent our shadows in the dallying shades 
 That round us lay. 
 
 Thenceforth, of fate estranged, 
 
 Each day beholds our widowed forms apart: 
 The word, the glance, the gesture, coldly changed, 
 
 As heart to heart. 
 
 But cometh night to hide 
 
 Life-wrecks, far drifted in the noonday sun, 
 And lo, our shadows, in the sombre tide, 
 
 Again are one!
 
 GONE. 
 
 THE sunshine seeks thee, and the day* 
 Without thee, lonely, wears away: 
 And where the twilight shadows pass, 
 And miss thy footprints on the grass, 
 They weep ; whereat the breezes sigh, 
 And, following to find thee, die. 
 
 33
 
 AGAINST THE SKY. 
 
 SEE, where the foliage fronts the sky, 
 How many a meaning we descry 
 That else had never to the eye 
 A signal shown! 
 
 So we, on life's horizon-line, 
 To watchers waiting for a sign, 
 Perchance interpret Love's design, 
 To us unknown. 
 
 34
 
 ILLUSION. 
 
 AS yonder circling heavens define 
 The limits of the sea, 
 And Death on Time's horizon-line 
 
 Shuts out Eternity j 
 So, while in banishment apart 
 
 Our widowed lives appear, 
 Still holds each love-encompassed heart 
 The centre of the sphere. 
 
 35
 
 SUNSET AT SEA. 
 
 LO, where he sinks from sight, 
 The day forgets her light j 
 Nor breathes a wave 
 To break the silence sweet, 
 Where sky and ocean meet 
 Above his grave.
 
 INTERPRETED. 
 
 LO, eastward o'er the billows white, 
 Faint -smiling wakes the Child of Night 
 From dreams all rosy with delight : 
 What means, O Sea, thy moaning ? 
 
 Full noon: and o'er a cloudless sky 
 Soft winnowings of fragrance fly : 
 In all the land no shadows lie : 
 What means, O Sea, thy moaning ? 
 
 Far westward, o'er a dying glow, 
 Long funeral waves of darkness flow : 
 Ah, well-a-day ! too late I know 
 What means, O Sea, thy moaning ! 
 
 37
 
 CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 
 
 WITH faith unshadowed by the night, 
 Undazzled by the day, 
 With hope that plumed thee for the flight, 
 
 And courage to assay, 
 God sent thee from the crowded ark, 
 
 Christ -bearer, like the dove, 
 To find, o'er sundering waters dark, 
 New lands for conquering Love.
 
 OFF SAN SALVADOR. 
 
 IT lay to westward as of old, 
 An emerald bar across the gold 
 Of sunset whence a vision grand 
 First beckoned to the stranger-land. 
 
 And on our deck, uncoffined, lay 
 A child, whose spirit far away 
 The wafture of an angel hand 
 Late welcomed to a stranger-land. 
 
 39
 
 A SIGH OF THE SEA. 
 
 " A T 7HY is it ? " once the Ocean asked, 
 
 VV As on a summer's day, 
 Basking beneath a cloudless sky, 
 In musing rest he lay, 
 
 " Why is it, that, unruffled still, 
 
 The welkin's brow I see, 
 While mine, with racking wind and tide, 
 
 Deep-furrowed oft must be ? 
 
 " Her richest gems, by night displayed, 
 
 Man's filching grasp defy ; 
 But safety for my treasures none, 
 
 Though buried deep they lie. 
 
 " The hands that from her diadem 
 
 In reverence recoil, 
 Are bold my depths to penetrate 
 
 And of their wealth despoil. 
 
 " A thousand ships with cruel keel 
 
 My writhing waves divide, 
 But mariner hath never steered 
 
 Athwart her tranquil tide. 
 
 40
 
 " Why is it thus, that rest to her 
 
 And toil to me is given, 
 That she the blessing ever meets, 
 
 And I, the curse of Heaven ? " 
 
 The Ether heard. Through all her depths 
 
 A deeper azure spread, 
 And to the murmuring Ocean thus, 
 
 With radiant smile, she said : 
 
 " Who cleaveth to the earth, as thou, 
 
 Ne'er knows tranquillity ; 
 Naught pulses in my bosom wide 
 
 But God, whose own am I."
 
 SHELL-TINTS. 
 
 SEA-SHELL, whence the rainbow dyes, 
 Flashing in thy sunset skies ? 
 Thou wast in the penal brine, 
 When appeared the saving sign. 
 " Yea j but when the bow was bended, 
 
 Hope, that hung it in the sky, 
 Down into the deep descended 
 
 Where the starless shadows lie j 
 And with tender touch of glory, 
 
 Traced in living lines of love, 
 On my lowly walls, the story 
 
 Written in the heavens above."
 
 THE LOST ANCHOR. 
 
 AH, sweet it was to feel the strain, 
 What time, unseen, the ship above 
 Stood steadfast to the storm that strove 
 To rend our kindred cords atwain ! 
 
 To feel, as feel the roots that grow 
 In darkness, when the stately tree 
 Resists the tempests, that in me 
 
 High Hope was planted far below ! 
 
 But now, as when a mother's breast 
 Misses the babe, my prisoned power 
 Deep-yearning, heart-like, hour by hour, 
 
 Unquiet aches in cankering rest. 
 
 43
 
 THE SEA-BUBBLE. 
 
 YEA } a bubble though I be, 
 Love, O man, that fashioned thee 
 Of the dust, created me 
 Not of earth, but of the sea : 
 Kindred blossoms then are we 
 Time-blooms on eternity. 
 
 44
 
 DE PROFUNDIS. 
 
 I HEED it all : no more 
 Than to my listening heart, 
 Were millions on the shore, 
 Couldst thou, O Sea, impart. 
 
 So, long in silence sealed, 
 The Word Ineffable 
 To Mary's heart revealed 
 E'en all that God could tell. 
 
 45
 
 ALTER IDEM 
 
 ' r I ^ IS what thou wast not what thou art, 
 
 J. Which I no longer know 
 That made thee sovereign of my heart, 
 
 And serves to keep thee so: 
 
 And couldst thou, coming to the throne, 
 
 Thy Self, unaltered, see, 
 Thou mightst the occupant disown, 
 
 And scout his sovereignty.
 
 FROM PARADISE. 
 
 ALL else that in the limit lies 
 Of fleeting time, I see: 
 The glance, Beloved, of thine eyes 
 Alone is lost to me. 
 
 And in the self-same interval, 
 
 The ever-changing place 
 Of light's horizon-line is all 
 
 That meets thy lonely gaze. 
 
 Behold the glimmer of a tear, 
 
 The twinkle of a star 
 The shadow and the light how near! 
 
 And yet, alas, how far! 
 
 47
 
 SELECTION. 
 
 AMONG the trees, O God, 
 Is there not one 
 That with unrivalled love 
 Thou look'st upon ? 
 
 And of all blessed birds, 
 
 Hath not thy Love 
 Found for its fittest mate 
 
 The homing dove ? 
 
 Or, mid the flame of flowers 
 
 That light the land, 
 Doth not the lily first 
 
 Before thee stand ? 
 
 So says my soul, O God, 
 
 The type of thee. 
 " In each life-circle, one 
 
 Was made for me."
 
 MAIDEN BLOOM. 
 
 WHERE the youthful rivals meet 
 Reddest Rose, and whitest Snow 
 From a trysting-place so sweet, 
 
 Which will soonest go ? 
 " Hence with life alone I stray," 
 
 Blushed the flower of balmy breath. 
 "Mine," the snow-wreath sighed, " to stay 
 Steadfast e'en in death." 
 
 49
 
 THE RAIN AND THE DEW. 
 
 npHOU hast fallen," said the Dewdrop 
 
 J. To a sister drop of rain, 
 " But wilt thou, wedded with the dust, 
 
 In banishment remain ? *' 
 
 tf Nay, Dewdrop, but anon with thee 
 
 The lowlier born than I 
 Uplifted shall I seek again 
 
 My native home, the sky.*'
 
 THE SHOWER. 
 
 \ GAINST the royal Blue, 
 
 /\.A Mist rebellious flew 
 A night-born, wind-uplifted shade 
 That for an angry moment stayed, 
 
 Then wept itself away. 
 
 The Earth with moistened eyes 
 
 Beholds the sunlit skies 
 Again : but never to forget 
 The Cloud whose life-drops mingle yet 
 
 With her maternal clay.
 
 RESIGNATION. 
 
 BEHOLD, in summer's parching thirst, 
 The while the waters pass them by, 
 The hills, like Tantalus accurst, 
 
 In silent anguish lie ; 
 Nor look they to the lowly vale 
 Wherein their famished shadows glide, 
 But, with uplifted glances pale, 
 The will of Heaven abide. 
 
 5 2
 
 THE SLEEPING BEAUTY. 
 
 THE sculptor in the marble found 
 Her hidden from the world around, 
 As in a donjon keep: 
 With gentle hand he took away 
 The coverlet that o'er her lay, 
 But left her fast asleep. 
 
 And still she slumbers; e'en as he 
 Who saw in far futurity 
 
 What now before us lies 
 The fairest vision that the stream 
 Of night, subsiding, leaves agleam 
 
 Beneath the noonday skies. 
 
 53
 
 CLEOPATRA TO THE ASP. 
 
 " Dost thou not see my baby at my breast, 
 That sucks the nurse asleep ? " 
 
 LIE thou where Life hath lain, 
 And let thy swifter pain 
 
 His rival prove j 
 Till, like the fertile Nile, 
 Death buries, mile for mile, 
 This waste of Love. 
 
 Soft ! Soft ! A sweeter kiss 
 Than Antony's is this ! 
 
 O regal Shade, 
 Luxurious as sleep 
 Upon thy bosom deep 
 
 My heart is laid.
 
 ADIEU. 
 
 GOD speed thee, setting Sun ! 
 Thy beams for me have spun 
 ,Of light to-day 
 A memory that one 
 Alone could bring, and none 
 Can take away. 
 
 55
 
 ASLEEP. 
 
 NAY, wake him not ! 
 Unfelt our presence near, 
 Nor falls a whisper on his dreaming ear: 
 He sees but Sleep's celestial visions clear, 
 All else forgot. 
 
 And who shall say 
 That, in life's waking dream, 
 There be not ever near us those we deem 
 (As now our faces to the Sleeper seem) 
 
 Far, far away ?
 
 IN SOLITUDE. 
 
 LIKE as a brook that all night long 
 Sings, as at noon, a bubble-song 
 To Sleep's unheeding ear, 
 The Poet to himself must sing, 
 When none but God is listening 
 The lullaby to hear. 
 
 57
 
 UNHEEDED. 
 
 YE heavens so cold and clear 
 Above me weeping here, 
 Where every blossom sheds a tear 
 
 My grief to see j 
 No wonder, free from stain, 
 Untroubled ye remain ; 
 The vapors gendering the rain 
 Are all with me !
 
 ALL IN ALL. 
 
 ONE heaven above ; 
 But many a heaven below 
 The dewdrops show 
 God's tenderness 
 
 Subdued in every teardrop to express 
 The whole of Love. 
 
 59
 
 THE DEWS. 
 
 WE come and go, as the breezes blow, 
 But whence or where 
 Hath ne'er been told in the legends old 
 
 By the dreaming seer. 
 The welcome rain to the parching plain 
 
 And the languid leaves, 
 The rattling hail on the burnished mail 
 
 Of the serried sheaves, 
 The silent snow on the wintry brow 
 
 Of the aged year, 
 Wends each his way in the track of day 
 
 From a clouded sphere : 
 But still as the fog in the dismal bog 
 
 Where the shifting sheen 
 Of the spectral lamp lights the marshes damp, 
 
 With a flash unseen 
 We drip through the night from the starlids bright, 
 
 On the sleeping flowers, 
 And deep in their breast is our perfumed rest 
 
 Through the darkened hours : 
 But again with the day we are up and away 
 
 With our stolen dyes, 
 To paint all the shrouds of the drifting clouds 
 
 In the eastern skies. 
 
 60
 
 THE LIFE-TIDE. 
 
 EACH wave that breaks upon the strand, 
 How swift soe'er to spurn the sand 
 
 And seek again the sea, 
 Christ-like, within its lifted hand 
 Must bear the stigma of the land 
 For all eternity. 
 
 61
 
 ONSET. 
 
 LO, where the routed shadows pass, 
 Upon each lifted blade of grass 
 The tokens of a fray 
 Pale life-drops from the heart of Night, 
 Mute witnesses of sudden flight 
 Before the host of Day. 
 
 62
 
 TO A BLIND BABE, SLEEPING. 
 
 ARE thy dreams dark ? or is the light 
 Alone denied thy waking sight, 
 While softer stars their vigils keep 
 Within thy hemisphere of sleep ? 
 
 Yea : haply, as noon-blinded beams 
 Awake in darkness, o'er thy dreams 
 The pity that begets our tears, 
 A kindling radiance appears.
 
 FORESHADOWED. 
 
 SWALLOW, with the spring returning, 
 In thine absence change hath been : 
 Dost thou mark the lonely places 
 
 Where no more my Love is seen ? 
 Never maiden welcomed thee 
 Home with lighter heart than she. 
 
 Flitting in the golden sunshine 
 Oft thy shadow o'er us strayed. 
 
 Still we smiled, nor recked the warning 
 Of a life-dividing shade, 
 
 Now, alas, the world to me 
 
 Mourns that doomful prophecy.
 
 SUSPENSE. 
 
 T) REATHLESS as the blue above thee 
 JD Where a pausing vapor lies ; 
 Here, the hearts on earth that love thee, 
 
 There, the souls in Paradise 
 Host for host expectant of thee ! 
 
 Who shall win the prize ?
 
 IMMORTALITY. 
 
 E'EN now the spirit moves 
 In visions yet to be, 
 Whereof the present proves 
 
 A dream and prophecy. 
 For still, the shadows gone, 
 
 With light forever new, 
 Behold, another dawn 
 
 Proclaims the promise true. 
 
 66
 
 SECURITY. 
 
 THE Noonday smiles to hear 
 The oft-repeated tale 
 Of shadows lurking near 
 Her sunbeams to assail : 
 
 Nor heeds the placid Night 
 
 A prophecy of doom 
 To drown her stars in light 
 
 As fathomless as gloom.
 
 PILGRIMS. 
 
 UNTO the fane of Silence come, 
 Love-led from alien lands, 
 Pale pilgrim Prayers with upward glance, 
 
 And falling tears, and lifted hands, 
 And lips with stanched emotion dumb, 
 To ask for utterance. 
 
 There, shadow-like, with folded wings, 
 
 In reverence apart. 
 They wait till lingering Time hath brought, 
 
 In words or music to the heart, 
 What Spring to wintry Nature brings, 
 
 Release for prisoned Thought. 
 
 68
 
 IN THE DEATH CHAMBER. 
 
 STILL upon the vacant wall 
 Doth the silver phantom fall, 
 Like a glory in the gloom 
 Of the long-deserted room. 
 
 Soul departed, can it be 
 Thou, death-laurelled majesty, 
 Mingling-, in the moon's disguise, 
 With our midnight reveries ? 
 
 69
 
 THE DEPARTED. 
 
 THEY cannot wholly pass away, 
 How far soe'er above ; 
 Nor we, the lingerers, wholly stay 
 
 Apart from those we love: 
 For spirits in eternity, 
 
 As shadows in the sun, 
 Reach backward into Time, as we, 
 Like lifted clouds, reach on.
 
 THE FOUNDLING. 
 
 WHAT time the wandering mother Night 
 Made ready to depart, 
 A new-born, trembling Dream of Light 
 
 She laid upon my heart. 
 " Keep it," she sighed, and bending low 
 
 Wept o' er it where it lay j 
 Then, suddenly as April snow, 
 Went vanishing away.
 
 RETROSPECT. 
 
 *T"^HE heavens that seemed so far away 
 
 JL When old-time grief was near, 
 Beyond the vista seen to-day, 
 
 Close o'er my life appear 5 
 For there, in reconcilement sweet, 
 
 The human and divine, 
 The loftiest and the lowliest, meet 
 
 On love's horizon-line. 
 
 72
 
 REFLECTION. 
 
 STARS that with a softer glow 
 Waken in the wave below, 
 All the stars above you grow 
 Wiser for the beams ye throw 
 Light whereby alone they know 
 Why we mortals love them so. 
 
 73
 
 COMMUNION. 
 
 ONCE when my heart was passion-free 
 To learn of things divine, 
 The soul of nature suddenly 
 Outpoured itself in mine. 
 
 I held the secrets of the deep, 
 
 And of the heavens above j 
 I knew the harmonies of sleep, 
 
 The mysteries of love. 
 
 And for a moment's interval 
 The earth, the sky, the sea 
 
 My soul encompassed, each and all, 
 As now they compass me. 
 
 To one in all, to all in one 
 Since Love the work began 
 
 Life's ever widening circles run, 
 Revealing God and man. 
 
 74
 
 TRANSFIGURATION. 
 
 r I ^HE cloud unto its parent stream 
 
 X That rushes to the sea 
 Reveals a fkr-reflected dream 
 
 Of heaven's tranquillity ; 
 And unto faith's adoring sight 
 
 A mystery appears, 
 A cloud transfigured of the light 
 
 In every tide of tears. 
 
 75
 
 BREAD. 
 
 STILL surmounting as I came 
 Wind and water, frost and flame, 
 Night and day, the livelong year, 
 From the burial-place of seed, 
 From the earth's maternal bosom, 
 Through the root, and stem, and blossom, 
 To supply thy present need, 
 Have I journeyed here.
 
 SAND. 
 
 STERILE sister though I be, 
 Twinborn to the barren Sea, 
 Yet of all things fruitful we 
 Wait the end; and presently, 
 Lo, they are not! then to me 
 (Children to the nurse's knee) 
 Come the billows fresh and free, 
 Breathing Immortality. 
 
 77
 
 THE MARSH. 
 
 r T^HE woods have voices, and the sea, 
 JL Her choral-song and threnody : 
 But thou alike to sun and rain 
 Dost mute and motionless remain. 
 
 As pilgrims to the shrine of Sleep, 
 Through all thy solemn spaces creep 
 The Tides a moment on thy breast 
 To pause in sacramental rest ; 
 Then, flooded with the mystery, 
 To sink reluctant to the sea, 
 In landward loneliness to yearn 
 Till to thy bosom they return.
 
 BEACON LIGHTS. 
 
 SISTER Blossoms, ye have kept 
 So near the Master while ye slept 
 That, as upon the Martyr's face, 
 His light celestial we trace 
 In yours, revealing dreams that He, 
 Asleep upon the stormy sea, 
 Beheld, as though your light alone 
 His beacon in the darkness shone. 
 
 79
 
 OUTSPEEDED. 
 
 nnO-NIGHT the onward-rushing train 
 JL Would bear thee far from me 5 
 But, winged with swifter dreams, again 
 My spirit flies to thee. 
 
 Nay, speeding far beyond thee, waits 
 
 To welcome thee anew, 
 Where Dawn is opening the gates 
 
 To let the darkness through. 
 
 So
 
 THE SIREN STREAM TO THE OUTCAST. 
 
 COME, for my waves what I can never know 
 Of calm bestow ; 
 And thou, alas, like them, hast wandered far J 
 
 Come, erring star 
 
 Aweary now come take thy fill of rest 
 Upon my breast. 
 
 Come, for they call thee. Lean thy listening ear 
 
 And thou shalt hear 
 How soft the sigh that woos thee to the deep 
 
 Of endless sleep, 
 Wherein the past and all its passion seem 
 
 A vanished dream. 
 
 Behold, I cleanse whatever of soilure clings 
 
 To drooping wings : 
 Whate'er abides of dust or cleaving clay, 
 
 I purge away ; 
 Like fire, refining, but apart from pain, 
 
 All dross and stain. 
 
 The fever-flame that through thy being bums, 
 
 My bosom yearns 
 To quench. Behold, the ripples run to meet 
 
 A sister's feet, 
 With murmurs, not of scorn, but tenderness, 
 
 To soothe and bless.
 
 AT LAST. 
 
 HOW full of phantoms are the days 
 That shorten as they go ! 
 Along the once frequented ways, 
 
 Alas, are none I know ! 
 Lone relic of reality, 
 I too a phantom fain would be. 
 
 82
 
 THE PILGRIM. 
 
 WHEN, but a child, I wandered hence, 
 Another child sweet Innocence, 
 My sister went with me: 
 But I have lost her, and am fain 
 To seek her in the home again 
 Where we were wont to be.
 
 MY GUIDE. 
 
 LIFT up thine eyes, my child, 
 That I may see 
 The innocence that smiled 
 In one like thee 
 
 Thy mother gone. 
 
 Scarce older than thou art, 
 
 With maiden power 
 She won a wayward heart, 
 
 That till that hour 
 
 Had worshipped none. 
 
 Swift as a bird of Spring 
 
 In joyous flight, 
 That cleaves with shadeless wing 
 
 The sea of light, 
 
 Our morning fled. 
 
 When, sudden gloom and lo! 
 
 A troubled sky 
 A wail of stifled woe 
 
 An agony . 
 
 And hope was dead. 
 
 84
 
 Then, as a crystal tear 
 
 Of sorrow born, 
 Didst thou, pale star, appear, 
 
 Like me forlorn 
 
 In cheerless night. 
 
 I wept, and weeping turned 
 
 To gaze on thee, 
 And through the mist discerned 
 
 A beam for me, 
 
 Lit of her light.
 
 GIULIO. 
 
 " T^ATHER !" the trembling voice betrayed 
 
 _F The troubled heart. " Be not afraid." 
 I softly answered : " Woe is me ! 
 Dead unto all but misery ! 
 And yet, a child of innocence 
 Is mine a son unknowing whence 
 His origin whom, unaware, 
 As with an angel's watchful care, 
 Thy gentle hand hath guided. Now 
 He waits the consecrating vow 
 Of priesthood, and to-morrow stands 
 A Levite, with uplifted hands 
 To bless thee. May a mother dare 
 To look upon that face, and share, 
 Unseen, the blessing of her son ? 
 Deny me not. So be it done 
 To thee in thy last agony, 
 As now thou doest unto me ! " 
 
 She had her will. Secluded there 
 Within a cloistered place of prayer, 
 We saw, and wept ; then, all unknown, 
 Shrunk back into the world, alone. 
 
 Days passed. A winter's cheerless morn 
 With summons came. A soul forlorn 
 86
 
 Craved help in danger imminent 5 
 And, Christlike, on his mission went 
 The new anointed. 
 
 " Strange, 1 ' he said, 
 " The gleams, like inspiration, shed 
 Upon the dying ! There she lay, 
 Poor reprobate ! life's stormy day 
 In clouds departing. Suddenly, 
 As from a trance, beholding me, 
 ' Giulio ! hast thou come ? * she cried, 
 And with her arms about me, died." 
 
 He wondered ; and I turned away, 
 Lest tears my secret should betray.
 
 BETRAYED. 
 
 WHEN first, a new-born babe, he smiled, 
 Ere yet a name was given, 
 We knew not if the stranger child 
 Were more of earth or heaven. 
 
 His eyes, twin dewdrops, took the light 
 
 Of noonday's perfect blue : 
 His cheeks, young apple-blossoms white, 
 
 To warmer blushes grew. 
 
 His lips, a rosy oracle, 
 
 And fragrant as a flower's, 
 Like breathing petals, seemed to tell 
 
 Of sweeter thoughts than ours. 
 
 His name ? It is a balmy word 
 
 Of sound and silence wove ; 
 We caught it when an Echo stirred 
 
 In sleep, and whispered " Love."
 
 THE FIRST SNOW-FALL. 
 
 THE Fir-tree felt it with a thrill 
 And murmur of content j 
 The last dead Leaf its cable slipt 
 And from its moorings went j 
 
 The selfsame silent messenger 
 
 To one the shibboleth 
 Of Life imparting, and to one 
 
 The countersign of Death.
 
 AN INTERVIEW. 
 
 I SAT with chill December 
 Beside the evening fire. 
 " And what do you remember,' 
 
 I ventured to inquire, 
 " Of seasons long forsaken ? " 
 
 He answered in amaze, 
 " My age you have mistaken : 
 I've lived but thirty days" 
 
 90
 
 ANTICIPATION. 
 *TnHE master scans the woven score 
 JL Of subtle harmonies, before 
 
 A note is stirred ; 
 And Nature now is pondering 
 The tidal symphony of Spring, 
 
 As yet unheard.
 
 THE TRYST OF SPRING. 
 
 STERN Winter sought the hand of Spring, 
 And, tempered to her milder mood, 
 Died leafless on the budding breast 
 He fondly wooed. 
 
 She wept for him her April tears, 
 But, from the shadows wandering soon, 
 Dreamed of a warmer love to come 
 With lordly June. 
 
 He scatters roses at her feet, 
 And sunshine o'er her queenly brow, 
 And through the listening silence breathes 
 A bridal vow. 
 
 She answers not ; but, like a mist 
 O'er-brimmed and tremulous with light, 
 In sudden tears she vanishes 
 Before his sight.
 
 ONE APRIL MORN. 
 
 TWIN violets amid the dew 
 Unfolded soft their petals blue 
 To find the winter's dream come true, 
 One April morn. 
 
 Two warmer, softer, violet eyes, 
 Beneath the selfsame April skies, 
 Fulfilled a dream of paradise, 
 One April morn. 
 
 Dawn-blossoms of a changeful day, 
 Ye would not till the twilight stay, 
 But, ere the noontide, sped away, 
 One April morn. 
 
 93
 
 AN APRIL PRAYER. 
 
 LORD, to thy signal-light the trees 
 In leaf and flower reply : 
 Let not my heart, more dull than these, 
 Alone unwakened lie. 
 
 94
 
 AN AUTUMN LEAF. 
 
 A NURSLING of the under-green, 
 A tethered wing I poised between 
 A heaven above and heaven below 
 Twin Sisters, mirrored in the glow 
 Of limpid waters where the breeze, 
 Blind comrade of the listening trees, 
 Came wakening with soft caress 
 The shadows dumb and motionless. 
 
 There once, at summer's close, a flame 
 Of fire and song, a Redbird came, 
 And, perched upon my parent limb, 
 Outpoured his soul. From joy abrim, 
 The bubbling vintage of his brain, 
 I quaffed, the while each fibre-vein, 
 Deep-reddening with emotion, stirred. 
 Alas ! he heeded not nor heard ! 
 But when he ceased, and flew away, 
 A panting prisoner I lay, 
 Close-fettered, till the kindred fire 
 Of frost lit up the autumn pyre : 
 Then, suddenly, the tidal swell 
 Of sap receded, and I fell. 
 
 95
 
 MATER DOLOROSA. 
 
 AGAIN maternal Autumn grieves, 
 As blood-like drip the maple leaves 
 On Nature's Calvary, 
 And every sap-forsaken limb 
 Renews the mystery of Him 
 Who died upon a Tree.
 
 INDIAN SUMMER. 
 
 NO more the battle or the chase 
 The phantom tribes pursue, 
 But each in its accustomed place 
 
 The Autumn hails anew : 
 And still from solemn councils set 
 
 On every hill and plain, 
 The smoke of many a calumet 
 Ascends to heaven again. 
 
 97
 
 OCTOBER. 
 
 BEHOLD, the fleeting swallow 
 Forsakes the frosty air ; 
 And leaves, alert to follow, 
 
 Are falling everywhere, 
 Like wounded birds, too weak 
 A distant clime to seek. 
 
 And soon, with silent pinions, 
 The fledglings of the North 
 
 From winter's wild dominions 
 Shall drift, affrighted, forth, 
 
 And, phantom-like, anon 
 
 Pursue the phantoms gone. 
 
 98
 
 FROM THE UNDERGROUND. 
 T) EH OLD, before the wintry gale, 
 JD Across the sea of Night, 
 How many a fragrant blossom-sail 
 Comes drifting to the light ! 
 
 Whence are they ? Who hath piloted 
 
 Their journey from afar ? 
 The self-same miracle that led 
 
 The Magi and the Star. 
 
 99
 
 THE SNOWDROP. 
 
 BEHOLD, from winter's sleeping side, 
 The sacramental power 
 Of Nature fashioneth a bride 
 As fair as Eden's flower.
 
 WIND-FLOWERS. 
 
 AS whispers for a moment rest 
 Upon the brink of sound, 
 Here fragrant breezes blossom-drest, 
 Half-visible are found.
 
 AN APRIL BLOOM. 
 
 WHENCE art thou ? From what cnrysalis 
 Of silence hast thou come ? 
 What thought in thee finds utterance 
 
 Of dateless ages dumb 
 Outspeeding in the distance far 
 The herald glances of a star 
 As yet unseen ? 
 
 Wast thou, ere thine awakening here, 
 
 In other realms a-bloom ? 
 Or swathed in seamless cerements 
 
 Of immemorial gloom, 
 Till now, as Nature's pulses move, 
 Thou blossomest, a breath of Love, 
 Her lips between ?
 
 PEACH BLOOM. 
 
 A DREAM in fragrant silence wrought, 
 l~x A blossoming of petaled thought, 
 A passion of these April days, 
 The blush of Nature now betrays. 
 
 103
 
 MIGNONETTE. 
 
 GIVE me the earth, and I might heap 
 A mountain from the plain j 
 Give me the waters of the deep, 
 
 I might their strength restrain j 
 But here a secret of the sod 
 Betrays the daintier hand of God. 
 
 104
 
 CLOVER. 
 
 T ITTLE masters, hat in hand, 
 
 J /Let me in your presence stand, 
 
 Till your silence solve for me 
 This your threefold mystery. 
 
 Tell me for I long to know > 
 How, in darkness there below, 
 Was your fairy fabric spun, 
 Spread and fashioned, three in one. 
 
 Did your gossips gold and blue, 
 Sky and Sunshine, choose for you, 
 Ere your triple forms were seen, 
 Suited liveries of green ? 
 
 Can ye if ye dwelt indeed 
 Captives of a prison seed 
 Like the Genie, once again 
 Get you back into the grain ? 
 
 Little masters, may I stand 
 In your presence, hat in hand, 
 Waiting till you solve for me 
 This your threefold mystery ? 
 
 105
 
 IMMORTELLES. 
 
 " nr*HEY toil not, neither do they spin " 
 Ji The blossom-Thoughts that here within 
 The garden of my soul arise j 
 Alike unheeding wintry skies, 
 Or sun or rain, or night or day, 
 And never hence to pass away. 
 
 106
 
 SONG OF THE MORNING-GLORIES. 
 
 WE wedded each a star, 
 A warrior true, 
 That plighted faith afar 
 In drops of dew. 
 
 But comes the cruel Dawn : 
 
 The dew is dry j 
 And we, our lovers gone, 
 
 Lamenting, die. 
 
 107
 
 "CONSIDER THE LILIES." 
 "TH IS not the radiant star above 
 
 X That breathes for me the lore of love 
 As doth the dewy censer sweet 
 That Heaven enkindles at my feet. 
 
 Yea, more for me of tenderness 
 Is uttered in the mute caress 
 Upon these moistened petals found, 
 Than e'er was wedded unto sound. 
 
 108
 
 TO A WOOD-VIOLET. 
 
 IN this secluded shrine, 
 O miracle of grace, 
 No mortal eye but mine 
 Hath looked upon thy face. 
 
 No shadow but mine own 
 
 Hath screened thee from the sight 
 Of Heaven, whose love alone 
 
 Hath led me to thy light. 
 
 Whereof as shade to shade 
 Is wedded in the sun, 
 
 A moment's glance hath made 
 Our souls forever one. 
 
 109
 
 A LOTUS BLOOM. 
 
 WAS the dream thou wovest me, 
 But a blossom-fantasy ? 
 When it faded from my brain, 
 Flushed it into flower again ? 
 
 When thy blossom withereth 
 When the fairer flower of Death 
 Weaves its vision shall the dream 
 Mine or thine, returning, seem ?
 
 A RUBRIC. 
 
 THE aster puts its purple on 
 When flowers begin to fall, 
 To suit the solemn antiphon 
 Of Autumn's ritual j 
 
 And deigns, unwearied, to stand 
 
 In robes pontifical, 
 Till Indian Summer leaves the land, 
 
 And Winter spreads the pall.
 
 THE SNOW-BIRD. 
 
 WHEN snow, like silence visible, 
 Hath hushed the summer bird, 
 Thy voice, a never-frozen rill 
 Of melody, is heard. 
 
 But when from winter's lethargy 
 
 The buds begin to blow, 
 Thy voice is mute, and suddenly 
 
 Thou vanishest like snow.
 
 TO THE WOOD-ROBIN. 
 
 r I ""HE wooing air is jubilant with song, 
 -L And blossoms swell 
 As leaps thy liquid melody along 
 
 The dusky dell, 
 Where Silence, late supreme, foregoes her wonted spell. 
 
 Ah, whence, in sylvan solitudes remote, 
 
 Hast learned the lore 
 That breeds delight in every echoing note, 
 
 The woodlands o'er j 
 
 As when, through slanting sun, descends the quicken- 
 ing shower ? 
 
 Thy hermitage is peopled with the dreams 
 
 That gladden sleep ; 
 Here Fancy dallies with delirious themes 
 
 Mid shadows deep, 
 Till eyes, unused to tears, with wild emotions weep. 
 
 We rise, alas, to find our visions fled ! 
 
 But thine remain. 
 Night weaves of golden harmonies the thread, 
 
 And fills thy brain 
 With joys that overflow in Love' s awakening strain.
 
 Yet thou, from mortal influence apart, 
 
 Seek' st naught of praise j 
 The empty plaudits of the emptier heart 
 
 Taint not thy lays : 
 Thy Maker's smile alone thy tuneful bosom sways. 
 
 Teach me, thou warbling eremite, to sing 
 
 Thy rhapsody ; 
 Nor borne on vain ambition's vaunting wing, 
 
 But led of thee, 
 To rise from earthly dreams to hymn Eternity. 
 
 114
 
 THE DEAD THRUSH. 
 
 LOVE of nest and mate and young, 
 Woke the music of his tongue, 
 While upon the fledgling's brain 
 Soft it fell as scattered grain, 
 There to blossom tone for tone 
 Into echoes of his own. 
 
 Doth the passion wholly die 
 When the fountainhead is dry? 
 Nay : as vapor from the sea, 
 Lives the dream eternally ; 
 Soon the silent clouds again 
 Melt in rhapsodies of rain.
 
 CHRISTMAS. 
 
 THE womb of Silence bears the Eternal Word, 
 And yet no sound is heard : 
 The womb of Mary, Virgin undefiled, 
 Mothers the Heaven-born Child. 
 
 116
 
 THE LAMB-CHILD. 
 
 WHEN Christ the Babe was born, 
 Full many a little lamb 
 Upon the wintry hills forlorn 
 Was nestled near its dam } 
 
 And, waking or asleep, 
 
 Upon His mother's breast, 
 For love of her, each mother-sheep 
 
 And baby-lamb He blessed. 
 
 117
 
 THE ANGEL'S CHRISTMAS QUEST. 
 TT THERE have ye laid my Lord ? 
 
 VV Behold, I find Him not ! 
 Hath He, in heaven adored, 
 
 His home forgot ? 
 Give me, O sons of men, 
 My truant God again P * 
 
 " A voice from sphere to sphere 
 A faltering murmur ran, 
 Behold, He is not here ! 
 Perchance with Man, 
 The lowlier made than we, 
 He hides His majesty.' " 
 
 Then, hushed in wondering awe, 
 The spirit held his breath, 
 And bowed : for, lo, he saw 
 
 O'ershadowing Death, 
 A Mother's hands above, 
 Swathing the limbs of Love I 
 
 118
 
 RESTRAINT. 
 
 PAUSE while thine eyes are alien to the scene 
 That lies before thee. Let the Fancy range, 
 
 As yet she may, sole sovereign of the strange 
 Uncharted region of that wide demesne 
 Where Truth the tyrant never yet hath been. 
 
 He, once supreme, as in a narrowed grange 
 
 Thenceforth abides forever Chance and Change 
 Foregone his guarded barriers between. 
 Pass not: before the all-discerning Light 
 
 The angels veil their faces. To the wise 
 The tree of Knowledge in their Eden stands 
 
 Untasted, lest the Death that in it lies 
 Prevail, the bud of Innocence to blight, 
 
 And cloud the glimpse of ever-widening lands. 
 
 119
 
 GLORIA IN EXCELSIS. 
 ''T* IS Christmas night ! Again - 
 J. But not from heaven to earth - 
 Rings forth the old refrain 
 " A Saviour's Birth ! " 
 
 Nay, listen : 't is below ! 
 A song that soars above, 
 From human hearts aglow 
 With heavenly love !
 
 ON CALVARY. 
 
 IN the shadow of the rood 
 Love and Shame together stood j 
 Love, that bade Him bear the blame 
 Of her fallen sister Shame j 
 Shame, that by the pangs thereof 
 Bade Him break His heart for Love.
 
 TO THE CRUCIFIX. 
 
 DAY after day the spear of morning bright 
 Pierces again the ever-wounded side, 
 Pointing at once the birthspring of the Light, 
 And where for Love the Light Eternal died.
 
 STABAT MATER. 
 
 THE star that in his splendor hid her own, 
 At Christ's Nativity, 
 Abides a widowed satellite alone, 
 On tearful Calvary.
 
 EASTER EVE. 
 
 LO , now His deadliest foes prevail ! 
 And where His bleeding footsteps fail, 
 Like wolves upon a victim's trail, 
 They gloat, in purple mockery, " Hail!" 
 
 O cloud ! O regal vesture torn ! 
 O shadow on the shoulders borne ! 
 O diadem ! one starry thorn 
 Shall blossom into Easter morn ! 
 
 124
 
 EASTER MORNING. 
 
 BEHOLD, the night of sorrow gone, 
 Like Magdalen the tearful Dawn 
 Goes forth with love's anointing sweet, 
 To kiss again the Master's feet !
 
 EASTER FLOWERS. 
 
 WE are His witnesses; out of the dim, 
 Dank region of Death we have risen with Him. 
 Back from our sepulchre rolleth the stone, 
 And Spring, the bright Angel, sits smiling thereon. 
 
 We are His witnesses. See, where we lay 
 The snow that late bound us is folded away j 
 And April, fair Magdalen, weeping anon, 
 Stands flooded with light of the new-risen Sun ! 
 
 126
 
 GOD. 
 
 I SEE Thee in the distant blue j 
 But in the Violet's dell of dew, 
 Behold, I breathe and touch Thee too. 
 
 127
 
 TENEBRjE. 
 
 WHATE'ER my darkness be, 
 'T is not, O Lord, of Thee : 
 The light is Thine alone ; 
 The shadows, all my own. 
 
 128
 
 DEUS ABSCONDITUS. 
 
 MY God has hid Himself from me 
 Behind whatever else I seej 
 Myself the nearest mystery 
 As far beyond my grasp as He. 
 
 And yet, in darkest night, I know, 
 While lives a doubt-discerning glow, 
 That larger lights above it throw 
 These shadows in the vale below. 
 
 129
 
 GOD'S LIKENESS. 
 
 NOT in mine own, but in my neighbor's face, 
 Must I Thine image trace : 
 Nor he in his, but in the light of mine, 
 Behold thy Face Divine. 
 
 130
 
 MY MEDIATOR. 
 
 " 1\I NE betwixt God and me ? " 
 l\l "Behold, my neighbor, thee, 
 Unto His lofty throne 
 He makes my stepping-stone."
 
 THE SONG OF THE MAN. 
 
 " r I ^HE woman gave, and I did eat." 
 
 JL Whereof gave she ? 
 " 'T was of the garden fruitage sweet 
 
 A portion fair to see j 
 She plucked and ate, and I did eat, 
 And lost alike are we ; 
 
 God saith, 
 Ye die the death ! 
 
 " The woman gave, and I did eat.'* 
 
 Whereof gave she ? 
 " 'Twas of her womb a Burden sweet - 
 
 But sad, alas, to see ; 
 She took and ate, and I did eat, 
 And saved alike are we } 
 
 God saith, 
 So dieth Death !" 
 
 132
 
 CHARITY 
 
 IF but the world would give to Love 
 The crumbs that from its table fall, 
 'T were bounty large enough for all 
 The famishing to feed thereof. 
 
 And Love, that still the laurel wins 
 Of Sacrifice, would lovelier grow, 
 And round the world a mantle throw 
 To hide its multitude of sins. 
 
 133
 
 FULFILMENT. 
 
 NO bloom forgotten ! but upon each face 
 The dews baptismal, and the selfsame sign 
 Of Night's communion, that the fervid gaze 
 Of Paschal Morning changes into wine. 
 
 134
 
 ON SEA AND LAND. 
 
 ONE sobbing wave, above her fellows blest, 
 His feet caressed : 
 
 One homeless heart the lone, unbidden guest - 
 Her God confessed. 
 
 135
 
 STILLING THE TEMPEST. 
 
 TWAS all she could: The gift that Nature 
 gave, 
 
 The torrent of her tresses did she spill 
 Before His feet : and lo, the troubled wave 
 
 Of passion heard His whisper, " Peace, be still t " 
 
 136
 
 THE POSTULANT. 
 
 IN ashes from the wasted fires of noon, 
 Aweary of the light, 
 Comes Evening, a tearful novice, soon 
 To take the veil of night. 
 
 137
 
 PURGATORY. 
 
 HOW long, O Lord, how long 
 These penal fires among ? 
 Till love with fiercer flame 
 The strength of torture tame.
 
 BETTER. 
 
 "OETTER for Sin to dwell from Heaven apart 
 
 JDln foulest night, 
 
 Than on its lidless eyeballs feel the dart 
 
 Of torturing Light. 
 Better to pine in floods of sulphurous fire, 
 
 Than far above 
 Behold the bliss of satisfied desire, 
 
 Nor taste thereof. 
 Yea, Love is Lord, e'en where the Powers of Pain 
 
 Undying dwell : 
 Defiled, in spotless glory to remain 
 
 Were deeper hell. 
 
 139
 
 LONE-LAND. 
 
 AROUND us lies a world invisible, 
 With isles of Dreams, and many a continent 
 Of Thought, and isthmus Fancy; where we dwell 
 
 Each as a lonely wanderer intent 
 Upon his vision; finding each his fears 
 And hopes encompassed by the tide of Tears. 
 
 140
 
 QUATRAINS.
 
 WOMAN. 
 
 'HALL she come down, and on our level 
 
 'stand ? 
 
 | Nay j God forbid it ! May a mother's 
 jyes 
 
 Love's earliest home, the heaven of Baby land 
 Forever bend above us as we rise. 
 
 143
 
 OPPORTUNITY. 
 
 ONCE only did the Angel stir 
 The pool, whereat She paused in pain : 
 Another step outspeeded her j 
 The waters ne'er have moved again.
 
 LIFE. 
 
 THE Power that lifts the leaf above 
 And sends the root below, 
 Sustains the heart in brother-love 
 And makes it heavenward grow.
 
 DEATH. 
 
 SO sweet to tired mortality the night 
 Of Life's laborious day, 
 That God himself, overwearied of the light, 
 Within its shadow lay. 
 
 146
 
 RELEASE. 
 
 SO long am I a prisoner 
 As Time and Thought surround me here : 
 When Time is dead, and Memory 
 Deserts the ramparts, I am free.
 
 LIGHT. 
 
 WE know thee not, save that when thou art gone, 
 Thy sister, Beauty, follows in thy train, 
 Leaving the soul in exile till the dawn 
 
 Come with the gift of franchisement again. 
 
 148
 
 IN DARKNESS. 
 
 DUMB Silence and her sightless sister Sleep 
 Glide, mistlike, through the deepening Vale of 
 
 Night } 
 
 Waking, where'er their shadowy garments sweep, 
 Dream-voices and an echoing dream of light. 
 
 149
 
 SILENCE. 
 
 A SEA wherein the rivers of all sound 
 Their streams incessant pour, 
 But whence no tide returning e'er hath found 
 An echo on the shore.
 
 FANCY. 
 
 A BOAT unmoored, wherein a dreamer lies, 
 The slumberous waves low-lisping of a land 
 Where Love, forever with unclouded eyes, 
 
 Goes, wed with wandering Music, hand in hand.
 
 FAME. 
 
 THEIR noonday never knows 
 What names immortal are : 
 'T is night alone that shows 
 How star surpasseth star. 
 
 152
 
 TIME'S LEGACY. 
 
 THE night so long to Grief, 
 The day to Joy so brief, 
 What shall Eternity 
 To each, unaltered, be! 
 
 153
 
 A CRISIS. 
 
 OLEAF, against the twilight seen, 
 Move not ; for at thy side 
 Gleams, trembling lest thou intervene, 
 My hope, my star, my guide. 
 
 154
 
 THE CYNOSURE. 
 
 SO let me in thy heaven of thought appear, 
 As doth a twilight star 
 The harbinger of tenderest hopes anear, 
 And memories afar. 
 
 155
 
 RESISTANCE. 
 
 T3 ESISTANCE to its pinions light 
 AXUplifts the bird in airy flight} 
 Resistance to the winged soul 
 Uplifts it to the lofty goal. 
 
 156
 
 THE BILLOWS. 
 
 OF tribes that in the desert fell 
 The wandering souls are we 
 Wind-scattered seed of Ishmael 
 Upon the sterile sea. 
 
 157
 
 THE VOYAGER. 
 
 COLUMBUS-LIKE, I sailed into the night, 
 V-^The sunset gold to find: 
 Alas! 'twas but the phantom of the light! 
 Life's Indies lay behind! 
 
 158
 
 ADRIFT. 
 
 THE calm horizon circles only me, 
 The centre of its measureless embrace, 
 A bubble on the bosom of the sea, 
 Itself a bubble in the bound of space. 
 
 159
 
 DEEP UNTO DEEP. 
 
 WHERE limpid waters lie between, 
 There only heaven to heaven is seen: 
 Where flows the tide of mutual tears 
 There only heart to heart appears. 
 
 160
 
 VESTIGES. 
 
 UPON the Isle of Time we trace 
 The signs of many a vanished race: 
 But on the sea that laps it round, 
 No memory of man is found. 
 
 161
 
 THE MID-DAY MOON. 
 
 BEHOLD, whatever wind prevail, 
 Slow westering, a phantom sail 
 The lonely soul of Yesterday 
 Unpiloted, pursues her way. 
 
 162
 
 TO AN EVENING SHADE. 
 
 O PILGRIM, ever yearning for the East, 
 What fate before thee lies ? 
 
 " The spouse of Night, and, from the wedding feast, 
 The Morning's sacrifice.'" 
 
 163
 
 HEROES. 
 
 A GAINST the night, a champion bright, 
 x\.The glow-worm, lifts a spear of light j 
 And, undismayed, the slenderest shade 
 Against the noonday bares a blade. 
 
 164
 
 LANIER'S FLUTE. 
 
 WHEN palsied at the pool of Thought 
 The Poet's words were found, 
 Thy voice the healing Angel brought 
 To touch them into sound. 
 
 165
 
 POE-CHOPIN. 
 
 O' ER each the soul of Beauty flung 
 A shadow mingled with the breath 
 Of music that the Sirens sung, 
 Whose utterance is death. 
 
 166
 
 TO AN EXILE. 
 
 AS still upon the prophet shone 
 A light, when God himself was gone, 
 So lives, unbanished from thine eyes, 
 The splendor of thy native skies. 
 
 167
 
 TO A DYING BABE. 
 
 O BUBBLE, break ! All heaven thou hast 
 Unsullied in thy heart ! 
 Ere Time its shadow on thee cast 
 Love calls thee to depart. 
 
 1 68
 
 MY SECRET. 
 
 "T* IS not what I am fain to hide, 
 
 JL That doth in deepest darkness dwell, 
 But what my tongue hath often tried, 
 
 Alas, in vain, to tell. 
 
 169
 
 IN ABSENCE. 
 
 ALL that thou art not, makes not up the sum 
 Of what thou art, beloved, unto me : 
 All other voices, wanting thine, are dumb j 
 All vision, in thine absence, vacancy. 
 
 
 170
 
 A REMONSTRANCE. 
 
 SING me no more, sweet warbler, for the dart 
 Of joy is keener than the flash of pain: 
 Sing me no more, for the re-echoed strain 
 Together with the silence breaks my heart. 
 
 171
 
 NEW AND OLD. 
 
 NEW blossoms from the selfsame earth, 
 Beneath the selfsame skies ; 
 New hope with dawn's perennial birth, 
 The selfsame heaven supplies. 
 
 172
 
 THE FIG-TREE. 
 
 FIRST go-between in fallen man's defence, 
 To shield, or share his blame. 
 Christ-like, to lend the robe of innocence 
 Wherewith to hide his shame. 
 
 173
 
 THE BEE AND THE BLOSSOMS. 
 
 WHY stand ye idle, blossoms bright, 
 The livelong summer day ? 
 ' ' Alas ! we labor all the night 
 For what thou takest away ! " 
 
 174
 
 BONE-CASTANETS. 
 
 APART, of death and silence we, 
 The fittest emblems found, 
 Together, mad with minstrelsy, 
 Leap into life and sound. 
 
 175
 
 SONNETS.
 
 DAYBREAK. 
 
 pHAT was thy dream, sweet Morning ? 
 jffor, behold, 
 
 ' Thine eyes are heavy with the balm of 
 ) night, 
 
 And, as reluctant lilies to the light, 
 The languid lids of lethargy unfold. 
 Was it the tale of Yesterday retold 
 
 An echo wakened from the western height, 
 Where the warm glow of sunset dalliance bright 
 Grew, with the pulse of waning passion, cold ? 
 Or was it some heraldic vision grand 
 Of legends that forgotten ages keep 
 In twilight, where the sundering shoals of day 
 Vex the dim sails, unpiloted, of Sleep, 
 
 Till, one by one, the freighting fancies gay, 
 Like bubbles, vanish on the treacherous strand ? 
 
 179
 
 FORECAST. 
 
 ALL night a rose, with budding warmth aglow, 
 Above a sleeper's dreamful visage hung, 
 
 Pale with intenser passion than the tongue 
 Of man is tuned to utter. Breathing low, 
 The night winds, fledged with odor, to and fro 
 Went wandering the languid leaves among ; 
 While darkling woke a mocking-bird, and sung 
 All echoes that the noonday warblers know. 
 The dream, the song, the odor, each in one 
 Upbreathing as a starry vapor, spread, 
 And from the golden minarets of morn, 
 Far heralding the unawakened sun, 
 A rapture as of poesy outshed 
 
 Upon the spirit of a babe unborn. 
 
 180
 
 TO AN IDOL. 
 
 MUTE oracle of meek humanity, 
 Save to its sense of blindness wholly blind, 
 
 That drifting wide in misery, to find 
 Some beacon o'er the night-encumbered sea, 
 Steered in pathetic ignorance to thee j 
 
 What sighs, what tears of agony confined 
 
 Within the sunless prison of the mind, 
 Walled up of doubt, and locked in mystery, 
 
 Couldst thou, if thought were voluble, reveal, 
 Of panting love, and hopes all winged to rise 
 
 But netted of bewilderment, and worn 
 
 To thin despair, deep-shuddering to feel 
 No warmth below, above, no sympathies, 
 
 No rest but in oblivion forlorn! 
 
 181
 
 KEDRON. 
 
 WHERE silence broods on ruin, thou alone, 
 Sweet oracle, in rippling numbers low, 
 
 Dost onward through the waste of ages flow, 
 As an eternal echo. With thy tone 
 Blent David's holy anthems, and the moan 
 
 That shook his heart in exile didst thou know, 
 
 What time his tears of tributary woe 
 Commingled with thy wave. And David's Son 
 In after years, on Love's vicarious way, 
 
 Breathed life above thee, and thy torrent told 
 Its music to the wide-proclaiming sea: 
 
 And still, through all earth's changes manifold, 
 Where death and silence strive for mastery, 
 
 Throbs the prophetic burden of thy lay. 
 
 182
 
 THE DRUID. 
 
 /^"* ODLIKE beneath his grave divinities, 
 
 v_JThe last of all their worshippers, he stood. 
 
 The shadows of a vanished multitude 
 Enwound him, and their voices in the breeze 
 Made murmur, while the meditative trees 
 
 Reared of their strong fraternal branches rude 
 
 A temple meet for prayer. What blossoms strewed 
 The path between Life's morning hours and these ? 
 What lay beyond the darkness ? He alone 
 
 The sunshine and the shadow and the dew 
 Had shared alike with leaf, and flower, and stem: 
 Their life had been his lesson j and from them 
 
 A dream of immortality he drew, 
 As in their fate foreshadowing his own. 
 
 183
 
 THE HERMIT. 
 
 HIGH on the hoary mountain-top he dwelt 
 Alone with God, whose handiwork above 
 
 The wonders of the firmament approve 
 In an eternal silence. There he spelt 
 The name of the Omnipotent, and knelt 
 
 In lowly reverence of adoring love. 
 
 Beneath him, all the elements that move 
 In Nature's prayerful harmonies he felt, 
 And knew their mystic meaning. Thus the tone 
 
 Of lifted billows, and the storm that sways 
 The forest-seas in chorus, spake alone 
 
 Divinity, scarce hidden from his gaze j 
 And with their mighty voices blent his own 
 
 In one majestic utterance of praise. 
 
 184
 
 POE. 
 
 SAD spirit, swathed in brief mortality, 
 Of Fate and fervid fantasies the prey, 
 
 Till the remorseless demon of dismay 
 O'erwhelmed thee lo! thy doleful destiny 
 Is chanted in the requiem of the sea 
 
 And shadowed in the crumbling ruins gray 
 
 That beetle o'er the tarn. Here all the day 
 The Raven broods on solitude and thee: 
 Here gloats the moon at midnight, while the Bells 
 
 Tremble, but speak not lest thy Ulalume 
 Should startle from her slumbers, or Lenore 
 Hearken the love-forbidden tone that tells i 
 
 The shrouded legend of thine early doom 
 And blast the bliss of heaven forevermore. 
 
 185
 
 SHELLEY. 
 
 SHELLEY, the ceaseless music of thy soul 
 Breathes in the Cloud and in the Skylark's song, 
 
 That float as an embodied dream along 
 The dewy lids of morning. In the dole 
 That haunts the West Wind, in the joyous roll 
 
 Of Arethusan fountains, or among 
 
 The wastes where Ozymandias the strong 
 Lies in colossal ruin, thy control 
 Speaks in the wedded rhyme. Thy spirit gave 
 
 A fragrance to all nature, and a tone 
 To inexpressive silence. Each apart 
 
 Earth, Air, and Ocean claims thee as its own j 
 The twain that bred thee, and the panting wave 
 That clasped thee, like an overflowing heart. 
 
 186
 
 AT KEATS' S GRAVE. 
 
 " T FEEL the flowers growing over me." 
 
 JL Prophetic thought! Behold, no cypress gloom 
 
 Portrays in dim memorial the doom 
 That quenched the ray of starlike destiny ! 
 E'en death itself deals tenderly with thee: 
 
 For here, the livelong year, the violets bloom 
 
 And swing their fragrant censers till the tomb 
 Forgets the legend of mortality. 
 Nay: while the pilgrim periods of time 
 
 Alternate song and holy requiem sing, 
 As through the circling centuries sublime 
 
 They scatter frost, or genial sunshine bring, 
 With gathered sweets of every varying clime 
 
 They weave around thee one perpetual Spring. 
 
 187
 
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