He taught me all the mercy, for he showed me So now I think my time is near; I trust it is. I know all the sin; Now, though my lamp was lighted late, there's The blessed music went that way my soul will have to go. One will let me in. Nor would I now be well, mother, again, if that And for myself, indeed, I care not if I go to-day; But Effie, you must comfort her when I am past away. could be; For my desire is but to pass to Him that died for XII. I shall not dazzle or shiver, By the mount or under the hill, Give me only a bud from the trees, Wheel, wheel through the sunshine, Among the thickest hazels of the brake In those old days when I was young and strong, Beside the nursery. Ah, I remember how I loved to wake, And find him singing on the self-same bough (I know it even now) Where, since the flit of bat, In ceaseless voice he sat, Trying the spring night over, like a tune, Beneath the vernal moon; And while I listed long, Day rose, and still he sang, And all his stanchless song, Fell out of the tall trees he sang among, My soul lies out like a basking hound, - I am warm with the suns that have long since set, I am warm with the summers that are not yet, From the backward shore to the shore before, A single self reposes, The nevermore with the evermore Above me mingles and closes ; As my soul lies out like the basking hound, I see a blooming world around, Springs to be, and springs for me O to lie a-dream, a-dream, To feel I may dream and to know you deem My work is done forever, And the palpitating fever, That gains and loses, loses and gains, And beats the hurrying blood on the brunt of a thousand pains, Cooled at once by that blood-let Upon the parapet; And all the tedious taskéd toil of the difficult long endeavor Solved and quit by no more fine Spanned and measured once for all On the soldier's bed, And three days on the ruined wall O to think my name is crost From duty's muster-roll; That I may slumber though the clarion call, And live the joy of an embodied soul Free as a liberated ghost. O to feel a life of deed Was emptied out to feed That fire of pain that burned so brief awhile, Or as a martyr on his funeral pile O to think, through good or ill, And though there's little I can say, Each will look kind with honor while he hears. And to your loving ears My thoughts will halt with honorable scars, And when my dark voice stumbles with the weight Of what it doth relate (Like that blind comrade, - blinded in the wars, Who bore the one-eyed brother that was lame), And I shall understand with unshed tears And she, Perhaps, O even she May look as she looked when I knew her For I'm neither fonder nor truer Than when she slighted my lovelorn youth, As a child that holds by his mother, In the ruddy and silent daisies, But I'll leave my glory to woo her, And I shall not be denied. And you will love her, brother dear, And perhaps next year you 'll bring me here THE ORPHANS. My chaise the village inn did gain, Across the way I silent sped, The time till supper to beguile, In moralizing o'er the dead That mouldered round the ancient pile. There many a humble green grave showed A faded beech its shadow brown A piece of bread between them lay, Which neither seemed inclined to take, And yet they looked so much a prey To want, it made my heart to ache. "My little children, let me know Why you in such distress appear, And why you wasteful from you throw That bread which many a one might cheer?" The little boy, in accents sweet, Replied, while tears each other chased, "Lady! we've not enough to eat, Ah! if we had, we should not waste. "But Sister Mary 's naughty grown, And will not eat, whate'er I say, Though sure I am the bread's her own, For she has tasted none to-day." "Indeed," the wan, starved Mary said, "Till Henry eats, I'll eat no more, For yesterday I got some bread, He's had none since the day before." My heart did swell, my bosom heave, And clasped the clay-cold hand of each. |