THE RAVEN. 283 "Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or devil! Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchantedIn this home by horror haunted-tell me truly, I imploreIs there is there balm in Gilead?-tell me-tell me, I implore !” Quoth the raven, "Nevermore !" "Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil !-prophet still, if bird or devil! By that heaven that bends above us―by that God we both adore, Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels name Le nore; Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels name Lenore !" Quoth the raven, "Nevermore !" "Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting "Get thee back into the tempest and the night's Plutonian shore ! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken !—quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the Aoor Shall be lifted-nevermore! EDGAR A. POE. 'T' My Thirty-sixth Year. MISSOLONGHI, Jan. 22, 1824. IS time this heart should be unmoved, Yet though I cannot be beloved, Still let me love! My days are in the yellow leaf, The flowers and fruits of love are gone: The fire that in my bosom preys The hope, the fear, the jealous care, But 't is not thus-and 't is not here Such thoughts should shake my soul, nor now, Where glory decks the hero's bier, Or binds his brow. LOSSES. The sword, the banner, and the field, 285 Awake!-not Greece-she is awake!— Tread those reviving passions down If thou regrett'st thy youth, why live? Seck out-less often sought than found-- LORD BYRON. Losses. PON the white sea-sand UPON There sat a pilgrim band, Telling the losses that their lives had known; While evening waned away From breezy cliff and bay, And the strong tides went out with weary moan. One spake, with quivering lip, Of a fair freighted ship, With all his household to the deep gone down; For a fair face long ago Lost in the darker depths of a great town. There were who mourned their youth For its brave hopes and memories ever green; Turned an eye that would not rest, For far-off hills whereon its joy had been. Some talked of vanished gold, Some of proud honors told, Some spake of friends that were their trust no more; And one of a green grave Beside a foreign wave, That made him sit so lonely on the shore. But when their tales were done, There spake among them one, A stranger, seeming from all sorrow free: "Sad losses have ye met, But mine is heavier yet; For a believing heart hath gone from me." "Alas!" these pilgrims said, "For the living and the dead For fortune's cruelty, for love's sore cross, For the wrecks of land and sea! But, however it came to thee, Thine, stranger, is life's last and heaviest loss." FRANCES BROWN. GOING OUT AND COMING IN. 287 IN Going Out and Coming In. N that home was joy and sorrow, where an infant first drew breath, While an aged sire was drawing near unto the gates of death His feebie pulse was failing and his eye was growing dim,He was standing on the threshold when they brought the babe to him: While to murmur forth a blessing on the little one he tried, In his trembling arms he raised it, pressed it to his lips-and died! An awful darkness resteth on the path they both begin, Who thus meet upon the threshold-Going out and Coming in! Going out unto the triumph, coming in unto the fight: Coming in unto the darkness, going out unto the light,Although the shadow deepened in the moment of eclipse, When he passed through the dread portal with a blessing on his lips: And to him who bravely conquers as he conquered in the strife, Life is but the way of dying, death is but the gate of life. in. ISABELLA CRAIG. NOW For a Timepiece. !-it is gone. Our brief hours travel post, Each with its thought or deed, its Why or How ;— But know, each parting hour gives up a ghost, To dwell within thee-an eternal Now! SAMUEL T. COLERIDGE. |