To a Child,
SIX YEARS OLD, DURING SICKNESS.
LEEP breathes at last from out thee,
My little patient boy,
And balmy rest about thee
Smooths off the day's annoy.
I sit me down and think
Of all thy winning ways;
Yet almost wish, with sudden shrink
That I had less to praise.
Thy sidelong pillow'd meekness,
Thy thanks to all that aid
Thy heart in pain and weakness,
Of fancied faults afraid;
The little trembling hand
That wipes thy quiet tears-
These, these are things that may demand
Dread memories for years.
Sorrows I've had severe ones,
I will not think of now;
And calmly, 'midst my dear ones,
Have wasted with dry brow;
But when thy fingers press
And pat my stooping head,
I cannot bear the gentleness-
The tears are in their bed.
Ah, first-born of thy mother!
When life and hope were new,
Kind playmate of thy brother,
Thy sister, father too;
My light where'er I go,
My bird when prison-bound,
My hand-in-hand companion-no,
My prayers shall hold thee round!
To say, "He has departed"
"His voice"-" his face"-" is gone;"
To feel impatient-hearted,
Yet feel we must bear on ;
Ah, I could not endure To whisper of such woe, Unless I felt this sleep ensure That it will not be so.
Yes, still he's fix'd, and sleeping!
This silence, too, the while-
Its very hush and creeping
Seem whispering us a smile ;—
Something divine and dim
Seems going by one's ear,
Like parting wings of cherubim,
Who say, "We've finish'd here."
TRIUMPHAL arch, that fill'st the sky
When storms prepare to part,
I ask not proud philosophy
To teach me what thou art.
Still seem as to my childhood's sight,
A midway station given
For happy spirits to alight
Betwixt the earth and heaven.
Can all that optics teach unfold
Thy form to please me so,
As when I dream'd of gems and gold
Hid in thy radiant bow?
When Science from Creation's face
Enchantment's veil withdraws,
What lovely visions yield their place
To cold material laws!
And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,
But words of the Most High,
Have told why first thy robe of beams
Was woven in the sky.
When o'er the green undeluged earth
Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,
How came the world's gray fathers forth
To watch thy sacred sign!
And when its yellow lustre smiled
O'er mountains yet untrod,
Each mother held aloft her child
To bless the bow of God.
Methinks thy jubilee to keep,
The first-made anthem rang
On earth, deliver'd from the deep,
And the first poet sang.
Nor ever shall the Muse's eye
Unraptured greet thy beam;
Theme of primeval prophecy,
Be still the poet's theme.
The earth to thee her incense yields,
The lark thy welcome sings,
When, glittering in the freshen'd fields,
The snowy mushroom springs.
How glorious is thy girdle cast
O'er mountain, tower, and town,
Or mirror'd in the ocean vast
A thousand fathoms down!
As fresh in yon horizon dark,
As young thy beauties seem,
As when the eagle from the ark
First sported in thy beam.
For, faithful to its sacred page,
Heaven still rebuilds its span,
Nor lets the type grow pale with age
That first spoke peace to man.
'HE watchman stood upon the topmost tower
Of old Calláo, and he struck the flag,
As he was wont, at eventide; and then,
Had he been told 'twas to an enemy,
He would have laugh'd; for he enjoy'd a joke,
And everything was peace. The air, the earth,
The peopled town beneath him, and the sea
All slumber'd in the beautiful repose
Of a clear summer evening. But, in troth,
There was an enemy, though there seem'd none.
And such an enemy-that, to it, the might
Of banded armies is but as a breath.
The watchman, gazing on the quiet sea,
Saw it at once recoil, as in affright--
Far off:-'twas in a moment-then, as soon-
Upward it rear'd its huge and mountainous bulk,
And with a horrid roar it swept along
Towards the town. He saw the people run—
He heard one vast and agonising cry
Of" Mercy! Mercy!”—and then all was still.
There were no people-neither town nor tower;
But a wide ocean rolling its black waves
With nothing to resist them.;—and a boat-
A single boat, the only visible thing,
Tossing beside him. He sprang into it ;-
And now no longer warder in Callao,
Through the lone wilderness of waves he drives,
Seeking a home; for his, and all his race,
Are in the bottom of the eternal flood.
OULS of poets dead and gone,
What Elysium have ye known,
Happy field or mossy cavern,
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
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