So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell! No token stone nor glittering shell, Of this brief thoughtful hour of musing by the Sea. LINES, WRITTEN ON HEARING OF THE DEATH OF SILAS WRIGHT, Of New York. As they who, tossing midst the storm at night, Lapped in its slumbers deep and ever long, Who now shall rally Freedom's scattering host? Who wear the mantle of the leader lost? Who stay the march of slavery? He, whose voice Hath called thee from thy task-field, shall not lack Yet bolder champions, to beat bravely back The wrong which, through his poor ones, reaches Him: Yet firmer hands shall Freedom's torchlights trim, And wave them high across the abysmal black, Till bound, dumb millions there shall see them and rejoice. 10th mo., 1847. LINES, ACCOMPANYING MANUSCRIPTS PRESENTED TO A FRIEND. 'Tis said that in the Holy Land The angels of the place have blessed The pilgrim's bed of desert sand, That down the hush of Syrian skies Some sweet-voiced saint at twilight sings The song whose holy symphonies Are beat by unseen wings; Till starting from his sandy bed, The wayworn wanderer looks to see The halo of an angel's head Shine through the tamarisk-tree. So through the shadows of my way So at the weary close of day Hath seemed thy voice of cheer. That pilgrim pressing to his goal The graceful palm-tree by the well, Each pictured saint, whose golden hair And loving Mary's tomb; And thus each tint or shade which falls The pleasant thought of thee. Of one, in sun and shade the same, Not blind to faults and follies, thou These light leaves at thy feet I lay- Chance shootings from a frail life-tree, That tree still clasps the kindly mould, There still the morning zephyrs play, Yet, even in genial sun and rain, Root, branch, and leaflet fail and fade; Oh, friend beloved, whose curious skill Keeps bright the last year's leaves and flowers, With warm, glad summer thoughts to fill The cold, dark, winter hours! Pressed on thy heart, the leaves I bring THE REWARD. WHO, looking backward from his manhood's prime, Of funeral cypress planted thick behind, Who bears no trace of passion's evil force? On the thronged pages of his memory's book, Regretful of the Past? Alas!-the evil which we fain would shun Is but to-morrow's weakness, prone to fall; Yet, who, thus looking backward o'er his years, Permitted, weak and sinful as he was, If he hath hidden the outcast, or let in Strength to the weak, and, in an hour of need, He has not lived in vain, and while he gives He gazes backward, and with hope before, RAPHAEL. I SHALL not soon forget that sight: A hazy warmth, a dreamy light, On Raphael's picture lay. |