A Library of Poetry and Song: Being Choice Selections from the Best Poets

I like May-bloom on thorn-tree, Thou like merry summer-bee ! Fit, that I be plucked for thee.

Yet who plucks me ? no one mourns ;

I have lived my season out,
And now die of my own thorns,

Which I could not live without.
Sweet, be merry! How the light
Comes and goes! If it be night,
Keep the candles in my sight.

Are there footsteps at the door ?

Look out quickly. Yea, or nay? Some one might be waiting for

Some last word that I might say.
Nay? So best ! - So angels would
Stand off clear from deathly road,
Not to cross the sight of God.

Colder grow my hands and feet,

When I wear the shroud I made, Let the folds lie straight and neat,

And the rosemary be spread,
That if any friend should come,
(To see thee, sweet !) all the room
May be lifted out of gloom.

And, dear Bertha, let me keep

On my hand this little ring, Which at nights, when others sleep,

I can still see glittering.
Let me wear it out of sight,
In the grave, — where it will light
All the dark up, day and night.

On that grave drop not a tear !

Else, though fathom-deep the place, Through the woollen shroud I wear

I shall feel it on my face.
Rather smile there, blessed one,
Thinking of me in the sun,
Or forget me, smiling on !

And that hour – beneath the beach

When I listened in a dream, E And he said, in his deep speech,

That he owed me all esteem
Each word swam in on my brain
With a dim, dilating pain,
Till it burst with that last strain.

I fell flooded with a dark,

In the silence of a swoon ;
When I rose, still, cold, and stark,

There was night, - I saw the moon ;
And the stars, each in its place,
And the May-blooms on the grass,
Seemed to wonder what I was.

And I walked as if apart

From myself when I could stand,
And I pitied my own heart,

As if I held it in my hand
Somewhat coldly, with a sense
Of fulfilled benevolence,

And a “ Poor thing” negligence.
And I answered coldly too,

When you met me at the door ;
And I only heard the dew

Dripping from me to the floor;
And the flowers I bade you see
Were too withered for the bee, -

As my life, henceforth, for me.
Do not weep so— - dear – heart-warm !

It was best as it befell !
If I say he did me harm,

I speak wild, - I am not well.
All his words were kind and good, -
He esteemed me! Only blood
Runs so faint in womanhood.

Then I always was too grave,
Liked the saddest ballads

sung, With that look, besides, we have

In our faces who die young.
I had died, dear, all the same,
Life's long, joyous, jostling game

Is too loud for my meek shame.
We are so unlike each other,

Thou and I, that none could guess We were children of one mother,

But for mutual tenderness.
Thou art rose-lined from the cold,
And meant, verily, to hold

Life's pure pleasures manifold.
I am pale as crocus grows

Close beside a rose-tree's root! Whosoe'er would reach the rose,

Treads the crocus underfoot;

Art thou near me ? nearer ? so !

Kiss me close upon the eyes,
That the earthly light may go

Sweetly as it used to rise,
When I watched the morning gray
Strike, betwixt the hills, the way
He was sure to come that day.

So no more vain words be said !

The hosannas nearer roll -
Mother, smile now on thy dead,

I am death-strong in my soul !
Mystic Dove alit on cross,
Guide the poor bird of the snows
Through the snow-wind above loss !

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

SIDNEY DOBELL

Jesus, victim, comprehending

As a peculiar darling? Lo, the flies
Love's divine self-abnegation,

Hum o'er him! Lo, a feather from the crow Cleanse my love in its self-spending, Falls in his parted lips ! Lo, his dead eyes And absorb the poor libation !

See not the raven! Lo, the worm, the worm
Wind my thread of life up higher, Creeps from his festering corse ! My God! my
Up through angels' hands of fire !

God!
I aspire while I expire !-

O Lord, Thou doest well. I am content.
If Thou have need of him he shall not stay.
But as one calleth to a servant, saying

“At such a time be with me," so, O Lord, HOMESICK.

Call him to Thee! O, bid him not in haste COME to me, O my Mother! come to me,

Straight whence he standeth. Let him lay aside

The soiléd tools of labor. Let him wash Thine own son slowly dying far away!

His hands of blood. Through the moist ways of the wide ocean, blown

Let him array himself By great invisible winds, come stately ships

Meet for his Lord, pure from the sweat and fume To this calm bay for quiet anchorage ;

Of corporal travail ! Lord, if he must die, They come, they rest awhile, they go away,

Let him die here. O, take him where Thou gavest ! But, O my Mother, never comest thou !

And even as once I held him in my womb The snow is round thy dwelling, the white snow, Till all things were fulfilled, and he came forth, That cold soft revelation pure as light,

So, O Lord, let me hold him in my grave And the pine-spire is mystically fringed, Till the time come, and Thou, who settest when Laced with incrusted silver. Here -ah me! The hinds shall calve, ordain a better birth ; The winter is decrepit, underborn,

And as I looked and saw my son, and wept A leper with no power but his disease.

For joy, I look again and see my son,
Why am I from thee, Mother, far from thee?

And weep again for joy of him and Thee !
Far from the frost enchantment, and the woods
Jewelled from bough to bough? O home, my

home!
O river in the valley of my home,

THE FAREWELL
With mazy-winding motion intricate,
Twisting thy deathless music underneath
The polished ice-work, - must I nevermore
Behold thee with familiar eyes, and watch

GONE, gone, — sold and gone,
Thy beauty changing with the changeful day,

To the rice-swamp dank and lone. Thy beauty constant to the constant change ? Where the slave-whip ceaseless swings,

Where the noisome insect stings,
Where the fever demon strews

Poison with the falling dews,
THE ABSENT SOLDIER SON.

Where the sickly sunbeams glare
Through the hot and misty air,

Gone, gone, — sold and gone,

To the rice-swamp dank and lone, LORD, I am weeping. As Thou wilt, O Lord,

From Virginia's hill and waters,
Do with him as Thou wilt ; but O my God,

Woe is me, my stolen daughters !
Let him come back to die! Let not the fowls
O'the air defile the body of my child,

Gone, gone, — sold and gone,
My own fair child, that when he was a babe,

To the rice-swamp dank and lone. I lift up in my arms and gave to Thee !

There no mother's eye is near them, Let not his garment, Lord, be vilely parted,

There no mother's ear can hear them ; Nor the fine linen which these hands have spun Never, when the torturing lash Fall to the stranger's lot! Shall the wild bird, Seams their back with many a gash, That would have pilfered of the ox, this year Shall a mother's kindness bless them, Disdain the pens and stalls ? Shall her blind Or a mother's arms caress them. young,

Gone, gone, -- sold and gone, That on the fleck and moult of brutish beasts

To the rice-swamp dank and lone, Had been too happy, sleep in cloth of gold

From Virginia's hills and waters, Whereof each thread is to this beating heart

Woe is me, my stolen daughters!

OF A VIRGINIA SLAVE MOTHER TO HER DAUGHTERS SOLD

IN TO SOUTHERN BONDAGE.

DAVID GRAY.

FROM

THE ROMAN."

Gone, gonc,

- sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
Toiling through the weary day,
And at night the spoiler's prey.
O that they had earlier died,
Sleeping calmly, side by side,
Where the tyrant's power is o'er,
And the fetter galls no more !
Gone; gone,

sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
From Virginia's hills and waters,
Woe is me, my stolen daughters !
Gone, gone, - sold and gone,

To the rice-swamp dank and lone.
By the holy love He beareth,
By the bruised reed He spareth,
O, may He, to whom alone
All their cruel wrongs are known,
Still their hope and refuge prove,
With a more than mother's love.

Gone, gone, - sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
From Virginia's hills and waters, –
Woe is me, my stolen daughters !

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.

But o blithe breezę ! and O great seas ! Though ne'er that earliest parting past, your

wide plain they join again, Together lead them home at last.

One port, methought, alike they sought,

One purpose hold where'er they fare ; O bounding breeze, O rushing seas,

At last, at last, unite them there.

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH

AE FOND KISS BEFORE WE PART.

AE fond kiss and then we sever!
Ae fareweel, alas ! forever !
Deep in heart-wrung tears I 'll pledge thee;
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.
Who shall say that fortune grieves him,
While the star of hope she leaves him ?
Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me ;
Dark despair around benights me.

Gone, gone,

sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone.
O, when weary, sad, and slow,
From the fields at night they go,
Faint with toil, and racked with pain,
To their cheerless homes again,
There no brother's voice shall greet them,-
There no father's welcome meet them.

Gone, gone,.- sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
From Virginia's hills and waters,
Woe is me, my stolen daughters !

Gone, gone, — sold and gone,

To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
From the tree whose shadow lay
On their childhood's place of play,
From the cool spring where they drank,
Rock, and hill, and rivulet bank, -
From the solemn house of prayer,
And the holy counsels there,

Gone, gone, — sold and gone,
To the rice-swamp dank and lone,
From Virginia's hills and waters,
Woe is me, my stolen daughters !

PARTING.

AS SHIPS BECALMED.

As ships becalmed at eve, that lay

With canvas drooping, side by side, Two towers of sail, at dawn of day

Are scarce long leagues apart descried.

When fell the night, up sprang the breeze,

And all the darkling hours they plied ; Nor dreamt but each the selfsame seas

By each was cleaving, side by side :

E'en so — but why the tale reveal

Of those whom, year by year unchanged, Brief absence joined anew, to feel,

Astounded, soul from soul estranged ?

At dead of night their sails were filled,

And onward each rejoicing steered ; Ah-! neither blame, for neither willed

Or wist what first with dawn appeared.

To veer, how vain! On, onward strain,

Brave barks !- in light, in darkness too ! Throngh winds and tides one compass guides :

To that and your own selves be true.

I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy Naething could resist my Nancy : But to see her was to love her, Love but her, and love forever.

ADIEU, ADIEU ! OUR DREAM OF LOVE-“If to fair India's coast we sail,

Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright, ADIEC, adieu ! our dream of love

Thy breath is Afric's spicy gale, Was far too sweet to linger long ;

Thy skin is ivory so white. Such hopes may bloom in bowers above,

Thus every beauteous object that I view But here they mock the fond and young.

Wakes in my soul some charm of lovely Sue. We met in hope, we part in tears ! Yet 0, 't is sadly sweet to know

“Though battle call me from thy arms, That life, in all its future years,

Let not my pretty Susan mourn ;

Though cannons roar, yet safe from harms Can reach us with no heavier blow!

William shall to his dear return. The hour is come, the spell is past;

Love turns aside the balls that round me fly, Far, far from thee, my only love,

Lest precious tears should drop from Susan's eye." Youth's earliest hope, and manhood's last, My darkened spirit turns to rove.

The boatswain gave the dreadful word,

The sails their swelling bosom spread ; Adieu, adieu! 0, dull and dread

No longer must she stay aboard ; Sinks on the ear that parting knell !

They kissed, she sighed, he hung his head. Hope and the dreams of love lie dead, — Her lessening boat unwilling rows to land; To them and thee, farewell, farewell ! “Adieu !” she cries; and waved her lily hand.

JOHN GAY

THOMAS K. HERVEY.

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