Where, half conceald, the eye of fancy views
Fauns, nymphs, and winged saints, all gracious to thy
muse!
Still in thy garden let me watch their pranks,
And see in Dian's vest between the ranks
Of the trim vines, some maid that half believes
The vestal fires, of which her lover grieves,
With that sly satyr peeping through the leaves !
FROM A CAVERN NEAR THE SUMMIT OF A
UNPERISHING youth!
Thou leapest from forth
The cell of thy hidden nativity;
Never mortal saw
The cradle of the strong one;
Never mortal heard
The gathering of his voices;
The deep-murmured charm of the son of the rock,
That is lisp'd evermore at his slumberless fountain.
There's a cloud at the portal, a spray-woven veil
At the shrine of his ceaseless renewing;
It embosoms the roses of dawn,
It entangles the shafts of the noon,
And into the bed of its stillness
The moonshine sinks down as in slumber,
That the son of the rock, that the nursling of heaven
May be born in a holy twilight!
The wild goat in awe
Looks up and beholds
Above thee the cliff inaccessible ;-
Thou at once full-born
Madd’nest in thy joyance,
Whirlest, shatterest, splittest,
Life invulnerable.
LOVE'S APPARITION AND EVANISHMENT,
LIKE a lone Arab, old and blind
Some caravan had left behind
Who sits beside a ruin'd well,
Where the shy sand-asps bask and swell;
And now he hangs his aged head aslant,
And listens for a human sound-in vain!
And now the aid, which heaven alone can grart,
Upturns his eyeless face from heaven to gain ;-
Even thus, in vacant mood, one sultry hour,
Resting my eye upon a drooping plant,
With brow low bent, within my garden bower,
I sate upon the couch of camomile ;
And—whether 'twas a transient sleep, perchance,
Flitted across the idle brain, the while
I watch'd the sickly calm with aimless scope,
In my own heart; or that, indeed a trance,
#* Turn'd my eye inward—thee, O genial Hope,
Love's elder sister! thee did I behold,
Drest as a bridesmaid, but all pale and cold,
With roseless cheek, all pale and cold and dim
Lie lifeless at my feet !
And then came Love, a sylph in bridal trim,
And stood beside my seat ;
She bent, and kissed her sister's lips,
As she was wont to do ;-
Alas! 'twas but a chilling breath
Woke just enough of life in death
To make Hope die anew.
Anxious to associate the name of a most dear and honored
friend with my own, I solicited and obtained the permission of Professor J. H. GREEN to permit the insertion of the two following poems, by him composed.
MORNING INVITATION TO A CHILD.
The house is a prison, the school-room's a cell ;
Leave study and books for the upland and dell;
Lay aside the dull poring, quit home and quit care ;
Sally forth ! sally forth! let us breathe the fresh air !
The sky dons its holiday mantle of blue;
The sun sips his morning refreshment of dew;
Shakes joyously laughing his tresses of light,
And here and there turns his eye piercing and bright;
Then jocund mounts up on his glorious car,
With smiles to the morn,—for he means to go far;-
While the clouds, that had newly paid court at his
levee, Spread sail to the breeze, and glide off in a bevy. Tree, and tree-tufted hedge-row, and, sparkling be
tween Dewy meadows enamelled in gold and in green, With king-cups and daisies, that all the year please, Sprays, petals and leaflets, that nod in the breeze, With carpets, and garlands, and wreaths, deck the way And tempt the blithe spirit still onward to stray, Itself its own home;—far away! far away!
The butterflies flutter in pairs round the bower;
The humble-bee sings in each bell of each flower;
The bee hums of heather and breeze-wooing hill,
And forgets in the sunshine his toil and his skill;
The birds carol gladly!—the lark mounts on high;
The swallows on wing make their tune to the eye,
And as birds of good omen, that summer loves well,
Ever wheeling, weave ever some magical spell.
The hunt is abroad :-hark! the horn sounds its note,
And seems to invite us to regions remote.
The horse in the meadow is stirred by the sound,
And neighing impatient o’erleaps the low mound;
Then proud in his speed o’cr the champaign he
bounds,
[hounds.
To the whoop of the huntsmen and tongue of the
Then stay not within, for on such a blest day
We can never quit home, while with Nature we
stray; far away,
The feverous dream is past! and I awake,
Alone and joyless in my prison-cell,
Again to ply the never ending toil,
And bid the task-worn memory weave again
The tangled threads, and ravelld skein of thought;
Disjointed fragments of my care-worn life!
The mirror of my soul,-ah! when again
To welcome and reflect calm joy and hope !
Again subsides, and smooths its turbid swell,
Late surging in the sweep of frenzy's blast,-
And the sad forms of scenes and deeds long past
Blend into spectral shapes and deathlike life,
And pass in silent, stern procession :-
The storm is past ;—but in the pause and hush,
Nor calm nor tranquil joy, nor peace are mine;
My spirit is rebuk’d!—and like a mist,
Despondency, in gray cold mantle clad,
In phantom form gigantic floats !-
That dream, That dream, that dreadful dream, the potent spell, That calls to life the phantoms of the past,Makes e'en oblivion memory's register,Still swells and vibrates in my throbbing brain! Again I wildly quaft'd the maddening bowl, Again I stak'd my all,—again the die Prov'd traitor to my hopes ;-and 'twas for her,
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