SWEET be thy rest! near holy shrine
A purer relic never lay:
A grave of blessedness is thine,
More rich than piles of sculptured clay.
For softly on these peaceful knolls
The feet of happy wanderers tread;
While Wharf his silver chariot rolls
In music oe'r his ample bed.
And none are here but those who come
In gentle indolence to roam,
Or feed in Bolton's holy gloom
Sweet memories of a distant home.
Sweet be thy rest!-the toils and woes
Of man, have left this magic bound,
Since Beauty's awful genius chose,
And breathed upon the sacred ground.
Those cliffs where purple shadows creep,
The stream scarce gleaming through the dell, These giant groves that guard its sleep, The present power of Beauty tell.
The crosier's place, the altar-stone,
Now echo gentle wisdom's speech;
And those dim cloisters, mute and lone,
Their meek and holy moral teach.
The shrine, the mitred Abbot's niche,
Where once unheeded incense spread,
Now with the woodbine's wreath is rich,
And sweets from vagrant roses shed.
Changed to a bounteous Baron's hall,
His gateway greets the wandering guest, And only on its arrased wall
The frowning warrior lifts his crest.
Where by a lonely taper's light
The cowled and captive bigot knelt, Now summer-suns beam cheerly bright, And evening's softest shadows melt.
Where once the yelling torrent's jaws
Death to the youthful hunter gave,
Scarce frolic beauty feigns a pause,
Then trusts her light foot to the wave.
Emblem of passion's changeful tide!
The flood that wrecked the heedless boy In after years is taught to glide
Through sheltering bowers of social joy.
For such a tomb of sweets and flowers,
By social gladness sacred made,
Midst warbling streams and golden bowers,
The priest of Persia's Eden prayed.
But far from thee shall be the torch
Of frantic mirth and impious rite;
A Christian Hafiz guards the porch,
And decks the Garden of Delight.
And only kindred hearts can bear
The smiling peace that slumbers here;
None but the pure in spirit dare
Gaze on a scene to heaven so near.
European Magazine.
Heu! quantum minus est reliquis versari, quam tui meminisse!
OH! sweetly o'er the Atlantic sea,
The moon, with melancholy smile,
Looks down, as I, beloved, on thee
Am fondly musing all the while:
And as, along the silver tide,
Its silent course the vessel steers,
I dream of days, when, side by side,
We roamed on eves of other years!
Though many a land, and many a wave,
Between us rise, between us roll,
Still, like a beacon, bright to save,
Thou sheddest light upon my soul.
And though the mist of years hath passed,
Since first I blessed its glorious shine,
Yet thoughts and woes-and days amassed,
Have only made it doubly thine!
How sweetly to the pensive mind
The dreams of other days awake,
And all the joys he left behind,
No more on earth to overtake!
Our wanderings by the sandy shore,—
Our walks along the twilight plain,—
The raptures that we felt of yore,—
And ne'er on earth shall feel again!
Unclouded moon! o'er rippling seas
Thou lookest down in placid grace;
With sails, expanded by the breeze,
Alert, our onward path we trace;
To foreign isles, and lands unknown,
We steer, where every sigh shall tell,
'Mid thousands as I walk alone,
My thoughts, with those far distant dwell.
Unclouded moon! 'tis sweet to mark
Thine aspect, so serene and calm,
Dispersing, vanquishing the dark,
And o'er our sorrows shedding balm.
Departed years like visions pass
Across the hot and fevered brow,
Blest years, and vanished eves, alas!
When thou did'st shine as thou dost now!
Oh! brightly as of yesterday
The dreams of vanished years awake,
The hopes that flattered to betray,
And left the joyless heart to break.—
I see thee, as I saw thee then,
Endowed by youth with magic charm;
I hear thee, as I heard thee, when
We roamed together, arm in arm.
It were a soothing thought, that thou
Perchance, now pondering, tak'st delight
To raise thy white, angelic brow,
And gaze upon this lovely night;
And that the very scenes might rise
Upon thy mind's reverted eye,
That draw from me a thousand sighs,
In starting up-and passing by.
"Twere nothing did we die-'twere nought
From life at once to pass away,
But thus to wither thought by thought,
And inch by inch, and day by day;
To mark the lingering tints of light,
As twilight o'er the sky expands,——
To mark the wave's receding flight,
That leaves the bleak and barren sands.
To see the stars that gem the sky
Fade one by one, to note the leaves
Drop from the boughs all witheringly,
Through which the wintry tempest grieves
'Tis this that chills the drooping heart,
That still we breathe, and feel, and live,
When all the flowers of earth depart,
And life hath not a joy to give!
Not parted yet not parted yet-
Though oceans roll, and roar between ;
A star that glitters ne'er to set,
Thou smilest bright, and shinest serene ;
Fair Ida! and the waste of life,
All bleak and barren though it be, Although a scene of care and strife, Has still a charm in having thee!
Blackwood's Magazine.
THE angel of the flowers one day,
Beneath a rose-tree sleeping lay,
That spirit to whom charge is given
To bathe young buds in dews of heaven;
Awaking from his light repose,
The angel whispered to the Rose:
O fondest object of my care,
'Still fairest found, where all are fair
'For the sweet shade thou givest to me,
'Ask what thou wilt 'tis granted thee.'
'Then,' said the Rose, with deepened glow,
'On me another grace bestow.'—
The spirit paused in silent thought,
What grace was there that flower had not?
'Twas but a moment-o'er the rose
A veil of moss the angel throws,
And robed in nature's simplest weed,
Could there a flower that rose exceed.
Literary Gazette.
|