Thou Eglantine, so bright with sunny showers,
Proud as a rainbow spanning half the vale,
Thou one fair shrub, oh! shed thy flowers,
And stir not in the gale.
For thus to see thee nodding in the air,
To see thy arch thus stretch and bend,
Thus rise and thus descend,-
Disturbs me till the sight is more than I can bear."
The Man who makes this feverish complaint
Is one of giant stature, who could dance
Equipped from head to foot in iron mail.
Ah gentle Love! if ever thought was thine
To store up kindred hours for me, thy face
Turn from me, gentle Love! nor let me walk
Within the sound of Emma's voice, nor know
Such happiness as I have known to-day.
THERE is a change-and I am poor;
Your love hath been, nor long ago,
A fountain at my fond heart's door,
Whose only business was to flow;
And flow it did; not taking heed
Of its own bounty, or my need.
What happy moments did I count!
Blest was I then all bliss above!
Now, for that consecrated fount
Of murmuring, sparkling, living love,
What have I ? shall I dare to tell?
A comfortless and hidden well.
A well of love-it may be deep
I trust it is, and never dry:
What matter? if the waters sleep
In silence and obscurity.
-Such change, and at the very door Of my fond heart, hath made me poor. 1806.
LET other bards of angels sing,
Bright suns without a spot;
But thou art no such perfect thing:
Rejoice that thou art not!
Heed not tho' none should call thee fair
So, Mary, let it be
If nought in loveliness compare
With what thou art to me.
True beauty dwells in deep retreats,
Whose veil is unremoved
Till heart with heart in concord beats,
And the lover is beloved.
YES! thou art fair, yet be not moved To scorn the declaration,
That sometimes I in thee have loved My fancy's own creation. Imagination needs must stir:
Dear Maid, this truth believe,
Minds that have nothing to confer
Find little to perceive.
Be pleased that nature made thee fit
To feed my heart's devotion,
By laws to which all Forms submit
In sky, air, earth, and ocean.
How rich that forehead's calm expanse!
How bright that heaven-directed glance!
-Waft her to glory, wingèd Powers,
Ere sorrow be renewed,
And intercourse with mortal hours
Bring back a humbler mood!
So looked Cecilia when she drew
An Angel from his station;
So looked; not ceasing to pursue
Her tuneful adoration!
But hand and voice alike are still;
No sound here sweeps away the will
That gave it birth: in service meek
One upright arm sustains the cheek,
And one across the bosom lies-
That rose, and now forgets to rise,
Subdued by breathless harmonies
Of meditative feeling;
Mute strains from worlds beyond the skie
Through the pure light of female eyes,
Their sanctity revealing!
1824.
WHAT heavenly smiles! O Lady mine
Through my very heart they shine;
And, if my brow gives back their light,
Do thou look gladly on the sight;
As the clear Moon with modest pride
Beholds her own bright beams
Reflected from the mountain's side
And from the headlong streams.
O DEARER far than light and life are dear,
Full oft our human foresight I deplore;
Trembling, through my unworthiness, with fear
That friends, by death disjoined, may meet no
more!
Misgivings, hard to vanquish or control,
Mix with the day, and cross the hour of rest;
While all the future, for thy purer soul,
With "sober certainties" of love is blest.
That sigh of thine, not meant for human ear,
Tells that these words thy humbleness offend;
Yet bear me up-else faltering in the rear
Of a steep march: support me to the end.
Peace settles where the intellect is meek,
And Love is dutiful in thought and deed;
Through Thee communion with that Love I
seek:
The faith Heaven strengthens where he moulds the Creed.
OF A FORSAKEN INDIAN WOMAN.
[When a Northern Indian, from sickness, is unable to continue his journey with his companions, he is left behind, covered over with deer-skins, and is supplied with water, food. and fuel, if the situation of the place will afford it. He is informed of the track which his companions intend to pursue, and if he be unable to follow, or overtake them, he perishes alone in the desert; unless he should have the good fortune to fall in with some other tribes of Indians. The females are equally, or still more, exposed to the same fate. See that very interes ng work "Hearne's Journey from Hudson's Bay to the Northern Ocean.' In the high northern latitudes, as the same writer informs us, when the northern lights vary their position in the air, they make a rustling and a crackling noise, as alluded to in the following poem.]
BEFORE I see another day, Oh let my body die away!
With our pastures about us, we could not be sad:
Our comfort was near if we ever were crost; But the comfort, the blessings, and wealth that we had,
We slighted them all,-and our birth-right was lost.
Oh, ill-judging sire of an innocent son Who must now be a wanderer! but peace to that strain !
Think of evening's repose when our labour was done,
The sabbath's return, and its leisure's soft chain !
And in sickness, if night had been sparing of sleep,
How cheerful, at sunrise, the hill where I stood, Looking down on the kine, and our treasure of sheep
That besprinkled the field; 'twas like youth in my blood!
Now I cleave to the house, and am dull as a snail;
And, oftentimes, hear the church-bell with a sigh,
That follows the thought-We've no land in the vale,
Save six feet of earth where our forefathers lie! 1804.
THE AFFLICTION OF MARGARET
WHERE art thou, my beloved Son,
Where art thou, worse to me than dead?
Oh find me, prosperous or undone !
Or, if the grave be now thy bed,
Why am I ignorant of the same
That I may rest; and neither blame
Nor sorrow may attend thy name?
II.
Seven
alas! to have received
years,
No tidings of an only child :
To have despaired, have hoped, believed,
And been for evermore beguiled;
Sometimes with thoughts of very bliss!
I catch at them, and then I miss ;
Was ever darkness like to this?
They pity me, and not my grief. Then come to me, my Son, or send Some tidings that my woes may end; I have no other earthly friend! 1804.
THE COTTAGER TO HER INFANT.
BY MY SISTER.
THE days are cold, the nights are long,
The north-wind sings a doleful song;
Then hush again upon my breast;
All merry things are now at rest,
Save thee, my pretty Love!
The kitten sleeps upon the hearth,
The crickets long have ceased their mirth;
There's nothing stirring in the house
Save one wee, hungry, nibbling mouse,
Then why so busy thou?
Nay! start not at that sparkling light;
'Tis but the moon that shines so bright
On the window pane bedropped with rain:
Then, little Darling! sleep again,
DEPARTED Child! I could forget thee once
Though at my bosom nursed; this woeful gain
Thy dissolution brings, that in my soul
Is present and perpetually abides
A shadow, never, never to be displaced
By the returning substance, seen or touched,
Seen by mine eyes, or clasped in my embrace.
Absence and death how differ they! and how
Shall I admit that nothing can restore
What one short sigh so easily removed?-
Death, life, and sleep, reality and thought
Assist me, God, their boundaries to know,
O teach me calm submission to thy Will!
The Child she mourned had overstepped the
pale
Of Infancy, but still did breathe the air
That sanctifies its confines, and partook
Reflected beams of that celestial light
To all the Little-ones on sinful earth
Not unvouchsafed-a light that warmed and
cheered
Those several qualities of heart and mind
Which, in her own blest nature, rooted deep,
Daily before the Mother's watchful eye,
And not hers only, their peculiar charms
Unfolded, beauty, for its present self,
And for its promises to future years,
With not unfrequent rapture fondly hailed.
Have you espied upon a dewy lawn
A pair of Leverets each provoking each
To a continuance of their fearless sport,
Two separate Creatures in their several gifts
Abounding, but so fashioned that, in all
That Nature prompts them to display, their
Their starts of motion and their fits of rest,
An undistinguishable style appears
And character of gladness, as if Spring
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