Life! we 've been long together

Through pleasant and through cloudy weather; 'T is hard to part when friends are dear,— Perhaps 't will cost a sigh, a tear;

Then steal away, give little warning,
Choose thine own time;

Say not Good Night,-but in some brighter clime
Bid me Good Morning.

c. 1825.

Anna Letitia Barbauld.

"MY DAYS AMONG THE DEAD ARE PAST"

My days among the Dead are past;
Around me I behold,

Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old;

My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.

With them I take delight in weal,
And seek relief in woe;

And, while I understand and feel
How much to them I owe,

My cheeks have often been bedew'd
With tears of thoughtful gratitude.

My thoughts are with the Dead; with them
I live in long-past years,

Their virtues love, their faults condemn,
Partake their hopes and fears,

12

And from their lessons seek and find
Instruction with an humble mind.

My hopes are with the Dead; anon
My place with them will be,
And I with them shall travel on
Through all futurity;

Yet leaving here a name, I trust,
That will not perish in the dust.

1818.

18

24

Robert Southey.

EACH AND ALL

LITTLE thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown,
Of thee from the hill-top looking down;

The heifer that lows in the upland farm,
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm;
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon,
Deems not that great Napoleon

Stops his horse, and lists with delight,

Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height;

Nor knowest thou what argument

Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.
All are needed by each one;

Nothing is fair or good alone.

I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough;

I brought him home, in his nest, at even;

He sings the song, but it cheers not now,

For I did not bring home the river and sky :— He sang to my ear,-they sang to my eye.

The delicate shells lay on the shore;

ΙΟ

The bubbles of the latest wave
Fresh pearls to their enamel gave,
And the bellowing of the savage sea
Greeted their safe escape to me.
I wiped away the weeds and foam,

I fetched my sea-born treasures home;

But the poor, unsightly, noisome things

Had left their beauty on the shore,

20

With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar. The lover watched his graceful maid,

As mid the virgin train she strayed,

Nor knew her beauty's best-attire

Was woven still by the snow-white choir.

At last she came to his hermitage,

30

Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage;

The gay enchantment was undone,

A gentle wife, but fairy none.

Then I said, "I covet truth;

Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat;

I leave it behind with the games of youth:
As I spoke, beneath my feet

The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath,
Running over the club-moss burrs;

I inhaled the violet's breath;

Around me stood the oaks and firs;

Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground;
Over me soared the eternal sky,

Full of light and of deity;

Again I saw, again I heard,

The rolling river, the morning bird;—
Beauty through my senses stole;

I yielded myself to the perfect whole.

1847.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

40

50

YOUTH AND AGE

VERSE, a breeze mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee—
Both were mine! Life went a-maying
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,

When I was young!

When I was young?-Ah, woeful When!
Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and Then!
This breathing house not built with hands,
This body that does me grievous wrong,
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands,
How lightly then it flashed along:-
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,

That ask no aid of sail or oar,

That fear no spite of wind or tide!

Nought cared this body for wind or weather
When Youth and I lived in 't together.
Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;

O! the joys, that came down shower-like,
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,

Ere I was old!

Ere I was old? Ah, woeful Ere,

Which tells me, Youth 's no longer here!
O Youth! for years so many and sweet,

ΙΟ

20

'T is known, that Thou and I were one,
I'll think it but a fond conceit-

It cannot be that Thou art gone!
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd:-
And thou wert aye a masker bold!
What strange disguise hast now put on,
To make believe, that thou art gone?
I see these locks in silvery slips,
This drooping gait, this altered size:
But Spring-tide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes!
Life is but thought: so think I will
That Youth and I are house-mates still.
Dew-drops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life 's a warning
That only serves to make us grieve,
When we are old:

That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave
Like some poor nigh-related guest,
That may not rudely be dismist;
Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

1823. 1828. 1832.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

THE FORERUNNERS

LONG I followed happy guides,
I could never reach their sides;
Their step is forth, and, ere the day,
Breaks up their leaguer, and away.

30

40

49