And veiled this world of beauty from my sight,
For long, long years!-Yon ever glorious sun
Darts his life-giving beams upon my heart,
And stirs it to a deeper sense of bliss
Than e'er it felt before. My pulses grow
Instinct with new existence, fresher life;
And all around me gathers as I gaze,
Hues of a more pervading loveliness
Than it was wont to wear! The clouds above
Flow on like molten silver; now and then
Fretted with crimson tinges, and anon
Streaked with the deep blue of the upper sky,
That spreads and spreads beyond them in a sea
Of living sapphire. Multitudes of forms,
Palpably bright and beautiful, are moving
Athwart the depths of heaven; and I see,—
So Fancy in her wayward mood would deem,—
File upon file of rich and gorgeous shapes
Advancing, and advancing without end!
Throned in a car, inwoven of the beams Of the descending sun, whose flashing wheels Leave a long trail of glory as they speed, Towers the mighty and majestic form Of the Imperial Captain;-HIM who led The forces of th' Omnipotent against The dark and daring Lucifer, and hurled The "race rebellious" to "combustion down" And "bottomless perdition!" On his brow, His starry brow, a coronal is wreathed, Worthy the temples of the King of kings! His shining sword is sheathless, and its blade, Like a death-dooming meteor ere it falls
In ruin upon earth, flashes in light,
In terrible light, whichever way it turns!
Celestial scorn, defiance without pride,
And all the wrath the son of God may own,
Hath curled his lip in beautiful disdain.
A huge, slow-moving mass appears to rise,
Darkening the sky. I look again, and lo!
Myriads of forms, in phalanx firm conjoined,
Press on to ruin in one turbulent host
'Gainst the celestial Chief. In the van,
The master Demon lifts his lordly crest
In proud and insolent triumph, and abroad
Waves his tremendous falchion! In his eye,
Pride, hate, ambition, cruelty are glassed,
As in a mirror. O'er his lofty front
His ebon locks, Medusa-like, are wreathed
In many a snaky fold; and on his brow,
Undiademed, are throned revenge sublime,
Bloated defiance, lust of pomp and power,
And resolution not to be subdued.
Those hostile bands advance, and now have gained Midway the arch of heaven!-They pause awhile,Then to the charge, and straight from pole to pole, The bray of battle rings!
Into the blushing bosom of the West,
And with him the bright pageant too hath vanished!
The clash of helm and shield, the sounds of war,
Fancy had wafted on my dreaming ear,
Have sunk to silence. Not a breath disturbs
The deep serene around me; and above,
Rises a lofty cupola of sky,
In blue, eye-soothing beauty and repose!
No battling seraphim are there; but clouds
Slow sailing on, in placid loveliness,
Like pleasure-barks upon a summer sea.
No shields and helms shine forth in dazzling lustre;
But where the God of day hath left his smile,
Are countless hues cameleon-like, that change
As the glance strives to trace them, and become
Momently deeper than before; anon,
Twilight begins to weave her fairy web
Of light and gloom, and, from the deepening East,
Night spreads her ebon arms to clasp the world.
MEET me at sunset, the hour we love best,
Ere day's last crimson blushes have died in the west;
When the shadowless ether is blue as thine eye,
And the breeze is as balmy and soft as thy sigh;
When giant-like forms lengthen fast o'er the ground
From the motionless mill and the linden trees round;
When the stillness below, the mild radiance above,
Softly sink on the heart, and attune it to love.
Meet me at sunset,-oh! meet me once more,
'Neath the wide-spreading thorn where you met me of yore,
INVOCATION TO THE ECHO OF A SEA-SHELL. 175
When our hearts were as calm as the broad summer sea
That lay gleaming before us, bright, boundless, and free;
And, with hand clasped in hand, we sat spell-bound, and
deemed
That life would be ever the thing it then seemed :—
The tree we then planted, green record, lives on,
But the hopes that grew with it are faded and gone.
Meet me at sunset, beloved, as of old,
When the boughs of the chestnut are waving in gold;
When the starry clematis bends down with its bloom,
And the jasmine exhales a more 'witching perfume.
That sweet hour shall atone for the anguish of years,
And though fortune still frown, bid us smile through our
Through the storms of the future shall soothe and sustain; Then, meet me at sunset-oh, meet me again!
INVOCATION TO THE ECHO OF A SEA-SHELL.
"Murmurings from within
Were heard, sonorous cadences, whereby
To his belief the monitor expressed
Mysterious union with its native sea."
VOICE of the deep, illimitable sea,
Discarded offspring of the wind and wave!
That, like a captive struggling to be free,
Thus ever moan'st in thy mysterious cave,—
Art thou a siren, by some sea-god's spell,
Prisoned in this smooth shell?
Or, but a spirit of the vasty deep,
Called up to earth by some enchanter's wand?Whose was the charm that broke thy long, cold sleep,
And sent thee, murmuring, from thy parent sand? How wert thou ushered to the realms of day,
Yet more,-I would know more! I burn to pierce
The hidden secrets of thine ocean home;-
Where are the victims of its surges fierce,
Who dreamed of calms, to wake amid their foam; The souls that perished 'neath the stormy wave,
When none were nigh to save?
Where are the stately ship and gallant crew,
Whose hapless fate is sealed to all beside;
The warrior bold a fear that never knew;
The gentler hearts that death could not divide?
Where are the lost and loved so many seek?
Speak, I conjure thee, speak!
How dost thou answer? With a low, sweet dirge,
Sad as the booming of the sullen main,
The far-off warnings of the restless surge,
When storms are growing into strength again!
Perchance a requiem for the glorious dead,
Youth, beauty, valour, fled.
Whate'er thy source and purpose, I rejoice
To list thy mystic murmurings, soft and clear:
To me thou seemest like a still, small voice,
By Conscience whispered in my world-vexed ear,
To lead my soul from grovelling things of earth,
To hopes of loftier birth!
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