The oak that in summer was sweet to hear, And his good sword rust ; His soul is with the saints, I trust. HYMN TO THE EARTH HEXAMETERS. EARTH! thou mother of numberless children, the nurse and the mother, Hail! O Goddess, thrice hail! Blest be thou! and, blessing, I hymn thee! Forth, ye sweet sounds! from my harp, and my voice shall float on your surges Soar thou aloft, O my soul! and bear up my song on thy pinions. Travelling the vale with mine eyes—green meadows and lake with green island, Dark in its basin of rock, and the bare stream flowing in brightness, Thrilled with thy beauty and love in the wooded slope of the mountain, Here, great mother, I lie, thy child, with his head on thy bosom ! [thy tresses, Playful the spirits of noon, that rushing soft through Green-haired goddess! refresh me; and hark! as they hurry or linger, [sical murmurs. Fill the pause of my harp, or sustain it with muInto my being thou murmurest joy, and tenderest sadness Shedd'st thou, like dew, on my heart, till the joy and the heavenly sadness Pour themselves forth from my heart in tears, and the hymn of thanksgiving. Earth! thou mother of numberless children, the [the rejoicer! nurse and the mother, Sister thou of the stars, and beloved by the sun, Guardian and friend of the moon, O Earth, whom the comets forget not, Yea, in the measureless distance wheel round and again they behold thee! [of creation?) Fadeless and young (and what if the latest birth Bride and consort of Heaven, that looks down upon thee enamoured! [goddess, Say, mysterious Earth! O say, great mother and Was it not well with thee then, when first thy lap was ungirdled, Thy lap to the genial Heaven, the day that he wooed thee and won thee! Fair was thy blush, the fairest and first of the blushes of morning! [self-retention : Deep was the shudder, O Earth! the throe of thy Inly thou strovest to flee, and didst seek thyself at [and forthwith Mightier far was the joy of thy sudden resilience; thy centre ! Myriad myriads of lives teemed forth from the mighty embracement. Thousand-fold tribes of dwellers, impelled by thousand-fold instincts, Filled, as a dream, the wide waters; the rivers sang on their channels ; Laughed on their shores the hoarse seas; the ing ocean swelled upward; yearn Young life lowed through the meadows, the woods, and the echoing mountains, Wandered bleating in valleys, and warbled on blossoming branches. WRITTEN DURING A TEMPORARY BLINDNESS, O, WHAT a life is the eye! what a strange and inscrutable essence! [warms him; Him, that is utterly blind, nor glimpses the fire that Him that never beheld the swelling breast of his [smiles in its slumber; mother; Him that smiled in his gladness as a babe that Even for him it exists! It moves and stirs in its prison ! Lives with a separate life: and [he murmurs: "Is it a spirit?" "Sure, it has thoughts of its own, and to see is only a language!" MAHOMET. UTTER the song, O my soul! the flight and return of Mohammed, Prophet and priest, who scatter'd abroad both evil and blessing, Huge wasteful empires founded and hallow'd slow persecution, Soul-withering, but crush'd the blasphemous rites of the Pagan And idolatrous Christians.-For veiling the Gospel of Jesus, They, the best corrupting, had made it worse than the vilest. Wherefore Heaven decreed th' enthusiast warrior of Mecca, Choosing good from iniquity rather than evil from goodness. Loud the tumult in Mecca surrounding the fane of the idol; Naked and prostrate the priesthood were laid—the people with mad shouts Thundering now, and now with saddest ululation Flew, as over the channel of rock-stone the ruinous river Shatters its waters abreast, and in mazy uproar bewilder'd, Rushes dividuous all-all rushing impetuous on ward. CATULLIAN HENDECASYLLABLES. HEAR, my beloved, an old Milesian story!— Rose a fair island; the god of flocks had plac'd it. Oft did a priestess, as lovely as a vision, Over the dusk wave, until the mighty sailor DUTY SURVIVING SELF-LOVE, THE ONLY SURE FRIEND OF DECLINING LIFE. A SOLILOQUY. UNCHANGED within to see all changed without |