Translated from the Spanish by W. C. BRYANT.
AIRS, that wander and murmur round, Bearing delight where'er ye blow! Make in the elms a lulling sound,
While my lady sleeps in the shade below.
Lighten and lengthen her noonday rest, Till the heat of the noonday sun is o'er. Sweet be her slumbers! though in my breast The pain she has waked may slumber no more. Breathing soft from the blue profound,
Bearing delight where'er ye blow, Make in the elms a lulling sound,
While my lady sleeps in the shade below.
Airs! that over the bending boughs, And under the shade of pendent leaves, Murmur soft, like my timid vows
Or the secret sighs my bosom heaves,- Gently sweeping the grassy ground, Bearing delight where'er ye blow, Make in the elms a lulling sound, While my lady sleeps in the shade below.
WE ARE EVER GETTING.
From the unknown volume already quoted.
THINGS Come into us, and we know not When they come or how:
We know not what's within, nor what We are getting now.
O let our eyes be ever open, And our bosoms wide;
Beauty is ever on us laving,
Like an incoming tide.
A flood of beauty is about us, Pressing to get in,
Through cracks and crannies of our senses, To the deep cave within.
Not to be lost-though lost it seem- Only to slumber long,
And out in after days to stream In gushes of sweet song.
THE twilight is sad and cloudy, The wind blows wild and free, And like the wings of sea-birds Flash the white caps of the sea.
But in the fisherman's cottage There shines a ruddier light, And a little face at the window Peers out into the night.
Close, close it is press'd to the window, As if those childish eyes
Were looking into the darkness,
To see some form arise.
And a woman's waving shadow Is passing to and fro, Now rising to the ceiling,
Now bowing and bending low.
What tale do the roaring ocean,
And the night-wind, bleak and wild, As they beat at the crazy casement, Tell to that little child?
And why do the roaring ocean,
And the night-wind, wild and bleak, As they beat at the heart of the mother, Drive the colour from her cheek?
MY BELOVED.
By OWEN MEREDITH.
WE are not happy-we may never be, Perchance again. Yet it is much to think We have been so: and ev'n tho' we must weep, We have enjoy'd.
The roses and the thorns
We have pluck'd together. We have proved both. Say, Was it not worth the bleeding hands they left us To have won such flowers? And if 'twere possible To keep them still-keep even the wither'd leaves, Even the wither'd leaves are worth our care. We will not tamely give up life-such life! What tho' the years before, like those behind, Be dark as clouds the thunder sits among, Tipt only here and there with a wan gold
More bright for rains between ?-tis much-tis more, For we shall ever think the sun's behind.
The sun must shine before the day goes down! Any thing better than the long, long night,
And that perpetual silence of the tomb!
By W. C. BRYANT, the American poet.
OH Life! I breathe thee in the breeze, I feel thee bounding in my veins, I see thee in these stretching trees, These flowers, this still rock's mossy stains.
This stream of odours flowing by
From clover-field and clumps of pine,
This music, thrilling all the sky,
From all the morning birds, are thine.
Thou fill'st with joy this little one, That leaps and shouts beside me here, Where Isar's clay-white rivulets run
Through the dark woods like frighted deer.
Ah! must thy mighty breath, that wakes Insect and bird, and flower and tree, From the low trodden dust, and makes Their daily gladness, pass from me-
Pass, pulse by pulse, till o'er the ground These limbs, now strong, shall creep with pain, And this fair world of sight and sound Seem fading into night again?
The things, oh Life! thou quickenest, all Strive upward toward the broad bright sky, Upward and outward, and they fall
Back to earth's bosom when they die.
All that have borne the touch of death, All that shall live, lie mingled there, Beneath that veil of bloom and breath, That living zone 'twixt earth and air.
There lies my chamber dark and still, The atoms trampled by my feet, There wait, to take the place I fill
In the sweet air and sunshine sweet.
Well, I have had my turn, have been Raised from the darkness of the clod, And for a glorious moment seen
The brightness of the skirts of God;
And knew the light within my breast, Though wavering oftentimes and dim, The power, the will, that never rest, And cannot die, were all from him.
Dear child! I know that thou wilt grieve To see me taken from thy love, Wilt seek my grave at sabbath eve, And weep, and scatter flowers above.
Thy little heart will soon be heal'd, And being shall be bliss, till thou To younger forms of life must yield The place thou fill'st with beauty now.
When we descend to dust again, Where will the final dwelling be Of Thought and all its memories then, My love for thee, and thine for me?
Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years! An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drown'd in tears, Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears, While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres.
Mimes, in the form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low, And hither and thither fly-
Mere puppets they, who come and go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Woe!
That motley drama-ch, be sure It shall not be forgot!
With its phantom chased for evermore, By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in To the self-same spot,
And much of madness and more of sin, And horror the soul of the plot.
But see, amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out The scenic solitude!
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