Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!Ho! dwellers in the vales!Ho! ye who by the chafing tideHave roughened in the gales!Leave barn and byre, leave kin and cot,Lay by the bloodless spade;Let desk, and case, and counter rot,And burn your books of trade.The despot roves your fairest lands;And till he flies or fears,Your fields must grow but armèd bands,Your sheaves be sheaves of spears!Give up to mildew and to rustThe useless tools of gain;And feed your country's sacred dustWith floods of crimson rain!Come, with the weapons at your call—With musket, pike, or knife;He wields the deadliest blade of allWho lightest holds his life.The arm that drives its unbought blowsWith all a patriot's scorn,Might brain a tyrant with a rose,Or stab him with a thorn.Does any falter? let him turnTo some brave maiden's eyes,And catch the holy fires that burnIn those sublunar skies.Oh! could you like your women feel,And in their spirit march,A day might see your lines of steelBeneath the victor's arch.What hope, O God! would not grow warmWhen thoughts like these give cheer?The Lily calmly braves the storm,And shall the Palm-tree fear?No! rather let its branches courtThe rack that sweeps the plain;And from the Lily's regal portLearn how to breast the strain!Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!Ho! dwellers in the vales!Ho! ye who by the roaring tideHave roughened in the gales!Come! flocking gayly to the fight,From forest, hill, and lake;We battle for our Country's right,And for the Lily's sake!
Calm as that second summer which precedesThe first fall of the snow,In the broad sunlight of heroic deeds,The City bides the foe.As yet, behind their ramparts stern and proud,Her bolted thunders sleep—Dark Sumter, like a battlemented cloud,Looms o'er the solemn deep.No Calpe frowns from lofty cliff or scarTo guard the holy strand;But Moultrie holds in leash her dogs of warAbove the level sand.And down the dunes a thousand guns lie couched,Unseen, beside the flood—Like tigers in some Orient jungle crouchedThat wait and watch for blood.Meanwhile, through streets still echoing with trade,Walk grave and thoughtful men,Whose hands may one day wield the patriot's bladeAs lightly as the pen.And maidens, with such eyes as would grow dimOver a bleeding hound,Seem each one to have caught the strength of himWhose sword she sadly bound.Thus girt without and garrisoned at home,Day patient following day,Old Charleston looks from roof, and spire, and dome,Across her tranquil bay.Ships, through a hundred foes, from Saxon landsAnd spicy Indian ports,Bring Saxon steel and iron to her hands,And Summer to her courts.But still, along yon dim Atlantic line,The only hostile smokeCreeps like a harmless mist above the brine,From some frail, floating oak.Shall the Spring dawn, and she still clad in smiles,And with an unscathed brow,Rest in the strong arms of her palm-crowned isles,As fair and free as now?We know not; in the temple of the FatesGod has inscribed her doom;And, all untroubled in her faith, she waitsThe triumph or the tomb.
Rich in red honors, that upon him lieAs lightly as the Summer dewsFall where he won his fame beneath the skyOf tropic Vera Cruz;Bold scorner of the cant that has its birthIn feeble or in failing powers;A lover of all frank and genial mirthThat wreathes the sword with flowers;He moves amid the warriors of the day,Just such a soldier as the artThat builds its trophies upon human clayMoulds of a cheerful heart.I see him in the battle that shall shake,Ere long, old Sumter's haughty crown,And from their dreams of peaceful traffic wakeThe wharves of yonder town;As calm as one would greet a pleasant guest,And quaff a cup to love and life,He hurls his deadliest thunders with a jest,And laughs amid the strife.Yet not the gravest soldier of them allSurveys a field with broader scope;And who behind that sea-encircled wallFights with a loftier hope?Gay Chieftain! on the crimson rolls of FameThy deeds are written with the sword;But there are gentler thoughts which, with thy name,Thy country's page shall hoard.A nature of that rare and happy castWhich looks, unsteeled, on murder's face;Through what dark scenes of bloodshed hast thou passed,Yet lost no social grace?So, when the bard depicts thee, thou shalt wieldThe weapon of a tyrant's doom,Round which, inscribed with many a well-fought field,The rose of joy shall bloom.
Written During the Meeting of the First Southern Congress,at Montgomery, February, 1861
IHath not the morning dawned with added light?And shall not evening call another starOut of the infinite regions of the night,To mark this day in Heaven? At last, we areA nation among nations; and the worldShall soon behold in many a distant portAnother flag unfurled!Now, come what may, whose favor need we court?And, under God, whose thunder need we fear?Thank Him who placed us hereBeneath so kind a sky—the very sunTakes part with us; and on our errands runAll breezes of the ocean; dew and rainDo noiseless battle for us; and the Year,And all the gentle daughters in her train,March in our ranks, and in our service wieldLong spears of golden grain!A yellow blossom as her fairy shield,June flings her azure banner to the wind,While in the order of their birthHer sisters pass, and many an ample fieldGrows white beneath their steps, till now, behold,Its endless sheets unfoldTHESNOWOFSOUTHERNSUMMERS!Let the earthRejoice! beneath those fleeces soft and warmOur happy land shall sleepIn a repose as deepAs if we lay intrenched behindWhole leagues of Russian ice and Arctic storm!IIAnd what if, mad with wrongs themselves have wrought,In their own treachery caught,By their own fears made bold,And leagued with him of old,Who long since in the limits of the NorthSet up his evil throne, and warred with God—What if, both mad and blinded in their rage,Our foes should fling us down their mortal gage,And with a hostile step profane our sod!We shall not shrink, my brothers, but go forthTo meet them, marshaled by the Lord of Hosts,And overshadowed by the mighty ghostsOf Moultrie and of Eutaw—who shall foilAuxiliars such as these? Nor these alone,But every stock and stoneShall help us; but the very soil,And all the generous wealth it gives to toil,And all for which we love our noble land,Shall fight beside, and through us; sea and strand,The heart of woman, and her hand,Tree, fruit, and flower, and every influence,Gentle, or grave, or grand;The winds in our defenceShall seem to blow; to us the hills shall lendTheir firmness and their calm;And in our stiffened sinews we shall blendThe strength of pine and palm!IIINor would we shun the battle-ground,Though weak as we are strong;Call up the clashing elements around,And test the right and wrong!On one side, creeds that dare to teachWhat Christ and Paul refrained to preach;Codes built upon a broken pledge,And Charity that whets a poniard's edge;Fair schemes that leave the neighboring poorTo starve and shiver at the schemer's door,While in the world's most liberal ranks enrolled,He turns some vast philanthropy to gold;Religion, taking every mortal formBut that a pure and Christian faith makes warm,Where not to vile fanatic passion urged,Or not in vague philosophies submerged,Repulsive with all Pharisaic leaven,And making laws to stay the laws of Heaven!And on the other, scorn of sordid gain,Unblemished honor, truth without a stain,Faith, justice, reverence, charitable wealth,And, for the poor and humble, laws which give,Not the mean right to buy the right to live,But life, and home, and health!To doubt the end were want of trust in God,Who, if he has decreedThat we must pass a redder seaThan that which rang to Miriam's holy glee,Will surely raise at needA Moses with his rod!IVBut let our fears—if fears we have—be still,And turn us to the future! Could we climbSome mighty Alp, and view the coming time,The rapturous sight would fillOur eyes with happy tears!Not only for the glories which the yearsShall bring us; not for lands from sea to sea,And wealth, and power, and peace, though these shall be;But for the distant peoples we shall bless,And the hushed murmurs of a world's distress:For, to give labor to the poor,The whole sad planet o'er,And save from want and crime the humblest door,Is one among the many ends for whichGod makes us great and rich!The hour perchance is not yet wholly ripeWhen all shall own it, but the typeWhereby we shall be known in every landIs that vast gulf which lips our Southern strand,And through the cold, untempered ocean poursIts genial streams, that far off Arctic shoresMay sometimes catch upon the softened breezeStrange tropic warmth and hints of summer seas.
Go forth and bid the land rejoice,Yet not too gladly, O my song!Breathe softly, as if mirth would wrongThe solemn rapture of thy voice.Be nothing lightly done or saidThis happy day! Our joy should flowAccordant with the lofty woeThat wails above the noble dead.Let him whose brow and breast were calmWhile yet the battle lay with God,Look down upon the crimson sodAnd gravely wear his mournful palm;And him, whose heart still weak from fearBeats all too gayly for the time,Know that intemperate glee is crimeWhile one dead hero claims a tear.Yet go thou forth, my song! and thrill,With sober joy, the troubled days;A nation's hymn of grateful praiseMay not be hushed for private ill.Our foes are fallen! Flash, ye wires!The mighty tidings far and nigh!Ye cities! write them on the skyIn purple and in emerald fires!They came with many a haughty boast;Their threats were heard on every breeze;They darkened half the neighboring seas;And swooped like vultures on the coast.False recreants in all knightly strife,Their way was wet with woman's tears;Behind them flamed the toil of years,And bloodshed stained the sheaves of life.They fought as tyrants fight, or slaves;God gave the dastards to our hands;Their bones are bleaching on the sands,Or mouldering slow in shallow graves.What though we hear about our pathThe heavens with howls of vengeance rent?The venom of their hate is spent;We need not heed their fangless wrath.Meantime the stream they strove to chainNow drinks a thousand springs, and sweepsWith broadening breast, and mightier deeps,And rushes onward to the main;While down the swelling current glidesOur Ship of State before the blast,With streamers poured from every mast,Her thunders roaring from her sides.Lord! bid the frenzied tempest cease,Hang out thy rainbow on the sea!Laugh round her, waves! in silver glee,And speed her to the port of peace!
The rain is plashing on my sill,But all the winds of Heaven are still;And so it falls with that dull soundWhich thrills us in the church-yard ground,When the first spadeful drops like leadUpon the coffin of the dead.Beyond my streaming window-pane,I cannot see the neighboring vane,Yet from its old familiar towerThe bell comes, muffled, through the shower.What strange and unsuspected linkOf feeling touched, has made me think—While with a vacant soul and eyeI watch that gray and stony sky—Of nameless graves on battle-plainsWashed by a single winter's rains,Where, some beneath Virginian hills,And some by green Atlantic rills,Some by the waters of the West,A myriad unknown heroes rest.Ah! not the chiefs, who, dying, seeTheir flags in front of victory,Or, at their life-blood's noble costPay for a battle nobly lost,Claim from their monumental bedsThe bitterest tears a nation sheds.Beneath yon lonely mound—the spotBy all save some fond few forgot—Lie the true martyrs of the fightWhich strikes for freedom and for right.Of them, their patriot zeal and pride,The lofty faith that with them died,No grateful page shall farther tellThan that so many bravely fell;And we can only dimly guessWhat worlds of all this world's distress,What utter woe, despair, and dearth,Their fate has brought to many a hearth.Just such a sky as this should weepAbove them, always, where they sleep;Yet, haply, at this very hour,Their graves are like a lover's bower;And Nature's self, with eyes unwet,Oblivious of the crimson debtTo which she owes her April grace,Laughs gayly o'er their burial-place.
Two armies stand enrolled beneathThe banner with the starry wreath;One, facing battle, blight and blast,Through twice a hundred fields has passed;Its deeds against a ruffian foe,Stream, valley, hill, and mountain know,Till every wind that sweeps the landGoes, glory laden, from the strand.The other, with a narrower scope,Yet led by not less grand a hope,Hath won, perhaps, as proud a place,And wears its fame with meeker grace.Wives march beneath its glittering sign,Fond mothers swell the lovely line,And many a sweetheart hides her blushIn the young patriot's generous flush.No breeze of battle ever fannedThe colors of that tender band;Its office is beside the bed,Where throbs some sick or wounded head.It does not court the soldier's tomb,But plies the needle and the loom;And, by a thousand peaceful deeds,Supplies a struggling nation's needs.Nor is that army's gentle mightUnfelt amid the deadly fight;It nerves the son's, the husband's hand,It points the lover's fearless brand;It thrills the languid, warms the cold,Gives even new courage to the bold;And sometimes lifts the veriest clodTo its own lofty trust in God.When Heaven shall blow the trump of peace,And bid this weary warfare cease,Their several missions nobly done,The triumph grasped, and freedom won,Both armies, from their toils at rest,Alike may claim the victor's crest,But each shall see its dearest prizeGleam softly from the other's eyes.
How grace this hallowed day?Shall happy bells, from yonder ancient spire,Send their glad greetings to each Christmas fireRound which the children play?Alas! for many a moon,That tongueless tower hath cleaved the Sabbath air,Mute as an obelisk of ice, aglareBeneath an Arctic noon.Shame to the foes that drownOur psalms of worship with their impious drum,The sweetest chimes in all the land lie dumbIn some far rustic town.There, let us think, they keep,Of the dead Yules which here beside the seaThey've ushered in with old-world, English glee,Some echoes in their sleep.How shall we grace the day?With feast, and song, and dance, and antique sports,And shout of happy children in the courts,And tales of ghost and fay?Is there indeed a door,Where the old pastimes, with their lawful noise,And all the merry round of Christmas joys,Could enter as of yore?Would not some pallid faceLook in upon the banquet, calling upDread shapes of battles in the wassail cup,And trouble all the place?How could we bear the mirth,While some loved reveler of a year agoKeeps his mute Christmas now beneath the snow,In cold Virginian earth?How shall we grace the day?Ah! let the thought that on this holy mornThe Prince of Peace—the Prince of Peace was born,Employ us, while we pray!Pray for the peace which longHath left this tortured land, and haply nowHolds its white court on some far mountain's brow,There hardly safe from wrong!Let every sacred faneCall its sad votaries to the shrine of God,And, with the cloister and the tented sod,Join in one solemn strain!With pomp of Roman form,With the grave ritual brought from England's shore,And with the simple faith which asks no moreThan that the heart be warm!He, who, till time shall cease,Will watch that earth, where once, not all in vain,He died to give us peace, may not disdainA prayer whose theme is—peace.Perhaps ere yet the SpringHath died into the Summer, over allThe land, the peace of His vast love shall fall,Like some protecting wing.Oh, ponder what it means!Oh, turn the rapturous thought in every way!Oh, give the vision and the fancy play,And shape the coming scenes!Peace in the quiet dales,Made rankly fertile by the blood of men,Peace in the woodland, and the lonely glen,Peace in the peopled vales!Peace in the crowded town,Peace in a thousand fields of waving grain,Peace in the highway and the flowery lane,Peace on the wind-swept down!Peace on the farthest seas,Peace in our sheltered bays and ample streams,Peace wheresoe'er our starry garland gleams,And peace in every breeze!Peace on the whirring marts,Peace where the scholar thinks, the hunter roams,Peace, God of Peace! peace, peace, in all our homes,And peace in all our hearts!
at Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, S.C., 1867
ISleep sweetly in your humble graves,Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause;Though yet no marble column cravesThe pilgrim here to pause.IIIn seeds of laurel in the earthThe blossom of your fame is blown,And somewhere, waiting for its birth,The shaft is in the stone!IIIMeanwhile, behalf the tardy yearsWhich keep in trust your storied tombs,Behold! your sisters bring their tears,And these memorial blooms.IVSmall tributes! but your shades will smileMore proudly on these wreaths to-day,Than when some cannon-moulded pileShall overlook this bay.VStoop, angels, hither from the skies!There is no holier spot of groundThan where defeated valor lies,By mourning beauty crowned!
I "Poet! If on a Lasting Fame Be Bent"
Poet! if on a lasting fame be bentThy unperturbing hopes, thou will not roamToo far from thine own happy heart and home;Cling to the lowly earth, and be content!So shall thy name be dear to many a heart;So shall the noblest truths by thee be taught;The flower and fruit of wholesome human thoughtBless the sweet labors of thy gentle art.The brightest stars are nearest to the earth,And we may track the mighty sun above,Even by the shadow of a slender flower.Always, O bard, humility is power!And thou mayst draw from matters of the hearthTruths wide as nations, and as deep as love.
II "Most Men Know Love But as a Part of Life"
Most men know love but as a part of life;They hide it in some corner of the breast,Even from themselves; and only when they restIn the brief pauses of that daily strife,Wherewith the world might else be not so rife,They draw it forth (as one draws forth a toyTo soothe some ardent, kiss-exacting boy)And hold it up to sister, child, or wife.Ah me! why may not love and life be one?Why walk we thus alone, when by our side,Love, like a visible God, might be our guide?How would the marts grow noble! and the street,Worn like a dungeon-floor by weary feet,Seem then a golden court-way of the Sun!
III "Life Ever Seems as from Its Present Site"
Life ever seems as from its present siteIt aimed to lure us. Mountains of the pastIt melts, with all their crags and caverns vast,Into a purple cloud! Across the nightWhich hides what is to be, it shoots a lightAll rosy with the yet unrisen dawn.Not the near daisies, but yon distant heightAttracts us, lying on this emerald lawn.And always, be the landscape what it may—Blue, misty hill or sweep of glimmering plain—It is the eye's endeavor still to gainThe fine, faint limit of the bounding day.God, haply, in this mystic mode, would fainHint of a happier home, far, far away!
IV "They Dub Thee Idler, Smiling Sneeringly"
They dub thee idler, smiling sneeringly,And why? because, forsooth, so many moons,Here dwelling voiceless by the voiceful sea,Thou hast not set thy thoughts to paltry tunesIn song or sonnet. Them these golden noonsOppress not with their beauty; they could prate,Even while a prophet read the solemn runesOn which is hanging some imperial fate.How know they, these good gossips, what to theeThe ocean and its wanderers may have brought?How know they, in their busy vacancy,With what far aim thy spirit may be fraught?Or that thou dost not bow thee silentlyBefore some great unutterable thought?
V "Some Truths There Be Are Better Left Unsaid"
Some truths there be are better left unsaid;Much is there that we may not speak unblamed.On words, as wings, how many joys have fled!The jealous fairies love not to be named.There is an old-world tale of one whose bedA genius graced, to all, save him, unknown;One day the secret passed his lips, and spedAs secrets speed—thenceforth he slept alone.Too much, oh! far too much is told in books;Too broad a daylight wraps us all and each.Ah! it is well that, deeper than our looks,Some secrets lie beyond conjecture's reach.Ah! it is well that in the soul are nooksThat will not open to the keys of speech.
VI "I Scarcely Grieve, O Nature! at the Lot"
I scarcely grieve, O Nature! at the lotThat pent my life within a city's bounds,And shut me from thy sweetest sights and sounds.Perhaps I had not learned, if some lone cotHad nursed a dreamy childhood, what the martTaught me amid its turmoil; so my youthHad missed full many a stern but wholesome truth.Here, too, O Nature! in this haunt of Art,Thy power is on me, and I own thy thrall.There is no unimpressive spot on earth!The beauty of the stars is over all,And Day and Darkness visit every hearth.Clouds do not scorn us: yonder factory's smokeLooked like a golden mist when morning broke.
VII "Grief Dies Like Joy; the Tears Upon My Cheek"
Grief dies like joy; the tears upon my cheekWill disappear like dew. Dear God! I knowThy kindly Providence hath made it so,And thank thee for the law. I am too weakTo make a friend of Sorrow, or to wear,With that dark angel ever by my side(Though to thy heaven there be no better guide),A front of manly calm. Yet, for I hearHow woe hath cleansed, how grief can deify,So weak a thing it seems that grief should die,And love and friendship with it, I could pray,That if it might not gloom upon my brow,Nor weigh upon my arm as it doth now,No grief of mine should ever pass away.
VIII "At Last, Beloved Nature! I Have Met"
At last, beloved Nature! I have metThee face to face upon thy breezy hills,And boldly, where thy inmost bowers are set,Gazed on thee naked in thy mountain rills.When first I felt thy breath upon my brow,Tears of strange ecstasy gushed out like rain,And with a longing, passionate as vain,I strove to clasp thee. But, I know not how,Always before me didst thou seem to glide;And often from one sunny mountain-side,Upon the next bright peak I saw thee kneel,And heard thy voice upon the billowy blast;But, climbing, only reached that shrine to feelThe shadow of a Presence which had passed.
IX "I Know Not Why, But All This Weary Day"
I know not why, but all this weary day,Suggested by no definite grief or pain,Sad fancies have been flitting through my brain;Now it has been a vessel losing way,Rounding a stormy headland; now a grayDull waste of clouds above a wintry main;And then, a banner, drooping in the rain,And meadows beaten into bloody clay.Strolling at random with this shadowy woeAt heart, I chanced to wander hither! Lo!A league of desolate marsh-land, with its lush,Hot grasses in a noisome, tide-left bed,And faint, warm airs, that rustle in the hush,Like whispers round the body of the dead!
X "Were I the Poet-Laureate of the Fairies"(Written on a very small sheet of note-paper)
Were I the poet-laureate of the fairies,Who in a rose-leaf finds too broad a page;Or could I, like your beautiful canaries,Sing with free heart and happy, in a cage;Perhaps I might within this little space(As in some Eastern tale, by magic power,A giant is imprisoned in a flower)Have told you something with a poet's grace.But I need wider limits, ampler scope,A world of freedom for a world of passion,And even then, the glory of my hopeWould not be uttered in its stateliest fashion;Yet, lady, when fit language shall have told it,You'll find one little heart enough to hold it!
XI "Which Are the Clouds, and Which the Mountains? See"
Which are the clouds, and which the mountains? See,They mix and melt together! Yon blue hillLooks fleeting as the vapors which distillTheir dews upon its summit, while the freeAnd far-off clouds, now solid, dark, and still,An aspect wear of calm eternity.Each seems the other, as our fancies will—The cloud a mount, the mount a cloud, and weGaze doubtfully. So everywhere on earth,This foothold where we stand with slipping feet,The unsubstantial and substantial meet,And we are fooled until made wise by Time.Is not the obvious lesson something worth,Lady? or have I wov'n an idle rhyme?
XII "What Gossamer Lures Thee Now? What Hope, What Name"
What gossamer lures thee now? What hope, what nameIs on thy lips? What dreams to fruit have grown?Thou who hast turnedONEPoet-heart to stone,Is thine yet burning with its seraph flame?Let me give back a warning of thine own,That, falling from thee many moons ago,Sank on my soul like the prophetic moanOf some young Sibyl shadowing her own woe.The words are thine, and will not do thee wrong,I only bind their solemn charge to song.Thy tread is on a quicksand—oh! be wise!Nor, in the passionate eagerness of youth,MISTAKE THY BOSOM-SERPENT'S GLITTERING EYESFOR THE CALM LIGHTS OF REASON AND OF TRUTH.
XIII "I Thank You, Kind and Best Beloved Friend"
I thank you, kind and best belovëd friend,With the same thanks one murmurs to a sister,When, for some gentle favor, he hath kissed her,Less for the gifts than for the love you send,Less for the flowers than what the flowers convey,If I, indeed, divine their meaning truly,And not unto myself ascribe, unduly,Things which you neither meant nor wished to say,Oh! tell me, is the hope then all misplaced?And am I flattered by my own affection?But in your beauteous gift, methought I tracedSomething above a short-lived predilection,And which, for that I know no dearer name,I designate as love, without love's flame.
XIV "Are These Wild Thoughts, Thus Fettered in My Rhymes"
Are these wild thoughts, thus fettered in my rhymes,Indeed the product of my heart and brain?How strange that on my ear the rhythmic strainFalls like faint memories of far-off times!When did I feel the sorrow, act the part,Which I have striv'n to shadow forth in song?In what dead century swept that mingled throngOf mighty pains and pleasures through my heart?Not in the yesterdays of that still lifeWhich I have passed so free and far from strife,But somewhere in this weary world I know,In some strange land, beneath some orient clime,I saw or shared a martyrdom sublime,And felt a deeper grief than any later woe.
XV In Memoriam—Harris Simons
True Christian, tender husband, gentle Sire,A stricken household mourns thee, but its lossIs Heaven's gain and thine; upon the crossGod hangs the crown, the pinion, and the lyre:And thou hast won them all. Could we desireTo quench that diadem's celestial light,To hush thy song and stay thy heavenward flight,Because we miss thee by this autumn fire?Ah, no! ah, no!—chant on!—soar on!—Reign on!For we are better—thou art happier thus;And haply from the splendor of thy throne,Or haply from the echoes of thy psalm,Something may fall upon us, like the calmTo which thou shalt hereafter welcome us!
and Respectfully Inscribed to the Officers and Members of theWashington Light Infantry of Charleston, February 22, 1859
A hundred years and more agoA little child was born—To-day, with pomp of martial show,We hail his natal morn.Who guessed as that poor infant weptUpon a woman's knee,A nation from the centuries steptAs weak and frail as he?Who saw the future on his browUpon that happy morn?We are a mighty nation nowBecause that child was born.To him, and to his spirit's scope,Besides a glorious home,We owe that what we have and hopeAre more than Greece and Rome.
Take first a Cowslip, then an Asphodel,A bridal Rose, some snowy Orange flowers;A Lily next, and by its spotless bellPlace the bright Iris, darling of the showers;Set gold Nasturtiums, Elder blooms between,And Heart's-ease to the Orchis marry sweetly;Then with red Pinks, and slips of Evergreen,You will possess—all folded up discreetly—In one bouquet, that none but you may know,The name I love beyond all names below.
I stooped from star-bright regions, whereThou canst not enter even in prayer;And thought to light thy heart and hearthWith all the poesy of earth.Oh, foolish hope! those mystic gleamsTo thee were unsubstantial dreams;The paltry world had made thee blind,And shut thy heart and dulled thy mind.I was a vassal at thy feet,And cringed more meanly than was meet,And since I dared not to be free,Was scouted as a slave should be.I gave thee all—my truth, my trust—I bowed my spirit in the dust,I put a crown upon thy brow,And am its proper victim now.
I know not why, but ev'n to meMy songs seem sweet when read to thee.Perhaps in this the pleasure lies—I read my thoughts within thine eyes.And so dare fancy that my artMay sink as deeply as thy heart.Perhaps I love to make my wordsSing round thee like so many birds,Or, maybe, they are only sweetAs they seem offerings at thy feet.Or haply, Lily, when I speak,I think, perchance, they touch thy cheek,Or with a yet more precious bliss,Die on thy red lips in a kiss.Each reason here—I cannot tell—Or all perhaps may solve the spell.But if she watch when I am by,Lily may deeper see than I.
I saw, or dreamed I saw, her sitting lone,Her neck bent like a swan's, her brown eyes thrownOn some sweet poem—his, I think, who singsOenone, or the hapless Maud: no ringsFlashed from the dainty fingers, which held backHer beautiful blonde hair. Ah! would these blackLocks of mine own were mingling with it now,And these warm lips were pressed against her brow!And, as she turned a page, methought I heard—Hush! could it be?—a faintly murmured word,It was so softly dwelt on—such a smilePlayed on her brow and wreathed her lip the whileThat my heart leaped to hear it, and a flameBurned on my forehead—Sa'ra!—'t was my name.
If I have graced no single song of mineWith thy sweet name, they all are full of thee;Thou art my Muse, my "May", my "Madeline":But "Julia"!—ah! that gentle name to meIs something far too sacred for the throngOf worldly listeners 'round me. Yet ev'n nowI weave a chaplet for thy sinless brow;—Wilt thou not wear it? 'T is a fashionable song,—I will not say of what,—but on it IHave wreaked heart, mind, my love, my hopes of fame,Yet after all it hath no nobler aimThan thy dear praise. Ere many moons pass by,When the lost gem is set, the crown complete,I'll lay a poet's tribute at thy feet.