With her bland and pensive tone,
The fairest Queen
That ever was seen
Would sit on my pearly throne;
And we'd lead such a merry, merry life,
That the stars would laugh in show'rs
Of silver light,
All the summer night,
To the airs of the passing Hours.
I'd be a Fairy King,
With my vassals brave and bold;
We'd hunt all day
Through the wildwood gay,
In our guise of green and gold.
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We'd talk with the dainty flow'rs,
And we'd chase the laughing brooks;
My merry men,
Through grove and glen,
Would search for the mossy nooks;
And we'd be such a merry, merry band,
Such a lively-hearted throng,
That life would seem
But a silvery dream
In the flowery Land of Song.
I'd be a Fairy King,
With my vassals brave and bold;
We'd hunt all day,
Through the wildwood gay,
In our guise of green and gold.
{91}
SONG--LOVE WHILE YOU MAY.
Day by day, with startling fleetness,
Life speeds away;
Love, alone, can glean its sweetness,
Love while you may.
While the soul is strong and fearless,
While the eye is bright and tearless,
Ere the heart is chilled and cheerless--
Love while you may.
Life may pass, but love, undying,
Dreads no decay;
Even from the grave replying,
"Love while you may."
Love's the fruit, as life's the flower;
Love is heaven's rarest dower;
Love gives love its quick'ning power--
Love while you may.
{92}
THE SNOWS.
UPPER OTTAWA.
Over the snows,
Buoyantly goes
The lumberers' bark canoe;
Lightly they sweep,
Wilder each leap,
Bending the white caps through.
Away! away!
With the speed of a startled deer,
While the steersman true,
And his laughing crew,
Sing of their wild career:
"Mariners glide
Far o'er the tide,
In ships that are staunch and strong;
Safely as they,
Speed we away,
Waking the woods with song."
Away! away!
With the flight of a startled deer,
While the laughing crew
Of the swift canoe
Sing of the raftsmen's cheer:
"Through forest and brake,
O'er rapid and lake,
We're sport for the sun and rain;
Free as the child
Of the Arab wild,
Hardened to toil and pain.
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Away! away!
With the speed of a startled deer,
While our buoyant flight,
And the rapid's might,
Heighten our swift career."
Over the snows
Buoyantly goes
The lumberers' bark canoe;
Lightly they sweep,
Wilder each leap,
Tearing the white caps through.
Away! away!
With the speed of a startled deer;
There's a fearless crew
In each light canoe,
To sing of the raftsmen's cheer.
{94}
THE RAPID.
ST. LAWRENCE.
All peacefully gliding,
The waters dividing,
The indolent bátteau moved slowly along,
The rowers, light-hearted,
From sorrow long parted,
Beguiled the dull moments with laughter and song:
"Hurrah for the Rapid! that merrily, merrily
Gambols and leaps on its tortuous way;
Soon we will enter it, cheerily, cheerily,
Pleased with its freshness, and wet with its spray."
More swiftly careering,
The wild Rapid nearing,
They dash down the stream like a terrified steed;
The surges delight them,
No terrors affright them,
Their voices keep pace with their quickening speed:
"Hurrah for the Rapid! that merrily, merrily
Shivers its arrows against us in play;
Now we have entered it, cheerily, cheerily,
Our spirits as light as its feathery spray."
Fast downward they're dashing,
Each fearless eye flashing,
Though danger awaits them on every side;
Yon rock--see it frowning!
They strike--they are drowning!
But downward they speed with the merciless tide;
{95}
No voice cheers the Rapid, that angrily, angrily
Shivers their bark in its maddening play;
Gaily they entered it--heedlessly recklessly,
Mingling their lives with its treacherous spray!
{96}
LOST AND FOUND.
In the mildest, greenest grove
Blest by sprite or fairy,
Where the melting echoes rove,
Voices sweet and airy;
Where the streams
Drink the beams
Of the Sun,
As they run
Riverward
Through the sward,
A shepherd went astray--
E'en gods have lost their way.
Every bird had sought its nest,
And each flower-spirit
Dreamed of that delicious rest
Mortals ne'er inherit;
Through the trees
Swept the breeze,
Bringing airs
Unawares
Through the grove,
Until love
Came down upon his heart,
Refusing to depart.
Hungrily he quaffed the strain,
Sweeter still, and clearer,
Drenched with music's mellow rain,
Nearer--nearer--dearer!
{97}
Chains of sound
Gently bound
The lost Youth,
Till, in sooth,
He stood there
A prisoner,
Raised between earth and heaven
By love's divinest leaven.
Was there ever such a face?
Was it not a vision?
Had he climbed the starry space,
To the fields Elysian?
Through the glade
The milk-maid
With her pail,
To the vale
Passed along,
Breathing song
Through all his ravished sense,
To gladden his suspense.
"Love is swift as hawk or hind,
Chamois-like in fleetness,
None are lost that love can find,"
Sang the maid, with sweetness.
"True, in sooth,"
Thought the Youth,
"Strong, as swift,
Love can lift
{98}
Mountain weights
To the gates
Of the celestial skies,
Where all else fades and dies."
Lightly flew the sunny days,
Joy and gladness sending;
Life becomes a song of praise
When true hearts are blending.
Guileless truth
Won the Youth,
Kept him there,
A prisoner;
While dear Love
From above
Poured down enduring dreams,
In calm supernal gleams.
{99}
YOUNG AGAIN.
Young again! Young again!
Beating heart! I deemed that sorrow,
With its torture-rack of pain,
Had eclipsed each bright to-morrow;
And that Love could never rise
Into life's cerulean skies,
Singing the divine refrain--
"Young again! Young again!"
Young again! Young again!
Passion dies as we grow older;
Love that in repose has lain,
Takes a higher flight, and bolder:
Fresh from rest and dewy sleep,
Like the skylark's matin sweep,
Singing the divine refrain--
"Young again! Young again!"
Young again! Young again!
Book of Youth, thy sunny pages
Here and there a tear may stain,
But 'tis Love that makes us sages.
Love, Hope, Youth--blest trinity!
Wanting these, and what were we?
Who would chant the sweet refrain--
"Young again! Young again!"
{100}
GLIMPSES.
Sounds of rural life and labour!
Not the notes of pipe and tabour,
Not the clash of helm and sabre
Bright'ning up the field of glory,
Can compare with thy ovations,
That make glad the hearts of nations;
E'en the poet's fond creations
Pale before thy simple story.
In the years beyond our present,
King was little more than peasant,
Labour was the shining crescent,
Toil, the poor man's crown of glory;
Have we passed from worse to better
Since we wove the silken fetter,
Changed the plough for book and letter.
Truest life for tinsel story?
Up the ladder of the ages
Clomb the patriarchal sages,
Solving nature's secret pages,
Kings of thought's supremest glory;
Eagle-winged, and sight far reaching--
Are we wiser for their teaching?--
Wrangling creeds for gentle preaching!
Falsest life for truest story!
Man is overfraught with culture,
Virtue early finds sepulture,
While our vices sate the vulture
{101}
We misname a bird of glory;
Life is blindly artificial,
Rarely pass we its initial,
All our aims are prejudicial
To its earnest, simple story.
Hail, primeval life and labour!
Martial notes of pipe and tabour,
Gleam of spears and clash of sabre,
Hero march from fields of glory,
All the thundering ovations
Surging from the hearts of nations,
Poet dreams and speculations,
Pale before thy simple story!
{102}
MY PRAYER.
O God! forgive the erring thought,
The erring word and deed,
And in thy mercy hear the Christ
Who comes to intercede.
My sins, like mountain-weights of lead,
Weigh heavy on my soul;
I'm bruised and broken in this strife,
But Thou canst make me whole.
Allay this fever of unrest,
That fights against the Will;
And in Thy still small voice do Thou
But whisper, "Peace, be still!"
Until within this heart of mine
Thy lasting peace come down,
Will all the waves of Passion roll,
Each good resolve to drown.
We walk in blindness and dark night
Through half our earthly way;
Our clouds of weaknesses obscure
The glory of the day.
We cannot lead the lives we would,
But grope in dumb amaze,
Leaving the straight and flowery paths
To tread the crooked ways.
{103}
We are as pilgrims toiling on
Through all the weary hours;
And our poor hands are torn with thorns,
Plucking life's tempting flowers.
We worship at a thousand shrines,
And build upon the sands,
Passing the one great Temple, and
The Rock on which it stands.
O, fading dream of human life!
What can this change portend?
I long for higher walks, and true
Progression without end.
Here I know nothing, and my search
Can find no secret out;
I cannot think a single thought
That is not mixed with doubt.
Relying on the higher source,
The influence divine,
I can but hope that light may dawn
Within this soul of mine.
I ask not wisdom, such as that
To which the world is prone,
Nor knowledge ask, unless it come
Direct from God alone.
Send down then, God! in mercy send
Thy Love and Truth to me,
That I may henceforth walk in light
That comes direct from Thee.
{104}
HER STAR.
When the heavens throb and vibrate
All along their silver veins,
To the mellow storm of music
Sweeping o'er the starry trains,
Heard by few, as erst by shepherds
On the far Chaldean plains:
Not the blazing, torch-like planets,
Not the Pleiads wild and free,
Not Arcturus, Mars, Uranus,
Bring the brightest dreams to me;
But I gaze in rapt devotion
On the central star of three.
Central star of three that tingle
In the balmy southern sky;
One above, and one below it,
Dreamily they pale and die,
As two lesser minds might dwindle,
When some great soul, passing by,
Stops, and reads their cherished secrets,
With a calm and godlike air,
Luring all their radiance from them
Leaving a dim twilight there,
Something vague, and half unreal,
Like the Alpha of despair.
{105}
Gazing thus, and holding converse
With the silence of my heart,
I would speak with famed Orion,
I would question it apart,
Wrest her love's strange secret from it,
If there's strength in human art.
And there come to me sweet whispers,
Half in answer, half in thought:--
"Be but strong, impassioned mortal!
Love will come to thee unsought;
Love is the divine Irene,--
It is given, and not bought.
[Transcriber's note: In the original book,
the e's in the "Irene" in the above verse
were e-macrons, Unicode U+0113.]
Strong of heart. Be wise, be steadfast,
Learn, endeavour, and endure;
Blest with strength and light, in wisdom
Make the higher purpose sure;
Never can her heart receive thee
Till thine own is rendered pure.
I but shone in truth above her;
Psyche-like, she yearned to me,
And her soul, an Aphrodite,
Rose above the ether sea.
Love. Love should and will inherit
The divine Euphrosyne."
When at night, the gleaming heavens
Throb through all their starry veins,
Oft I ponder on Orion,
And I hear celestial strains
Passing through my soul, and flooding
All its green immortal plains.
{106}
Then I pray for strength Promethean,
Pray for power to endure;
Then I say, O soul, be steadfast!
Make the lofty purpose sure;
And that love may be all-worthy,
God of heaven, make me pure!
{107}
THE MYSTERY.
My mind is like a troubled sea
O'er which the winds forever sweep;
Within its depths, eternally,
My being's pulses throb and leap;
There germs of contemplation sleep,
Like stars beyond the Milky Way,--
Like pearls within the gloomy deep,
That never saw the light of day.
Oh, wondrous mind, how little known!
Whence comes the thought that through my brain
Floats weirdlike as the pleasing tone
That quickens a belovèd strain?
It may have graced some sweet refrain
A thousand years ago, or more;
Some Norman Prince, some valiant Dane,
May have imbibed it with their lore.
It may have strengthened Plato's soul,
Its clarion echoes ringing through
His brain, the heaven-reaching goal
Whence wisdom had its starry view;
It may have cheered the gifted few
Whose minds were mints of royal song,
Who toiled where Shakespeare soared, and drew
Down blessings from the grateful throng.
And on for ages yet to come,
Through minds by heavenly impulse fired,
That thought may strike some scorner dumb,
In all its regal guise attired;
{108}
Divinely blest, though uninspired,
Some soul may change its swift career,
Bearing the great truth, long-desired,
In triumph to the highest sphere.
Unbounded universe of Thought!
Illimitable realms of mind!
Regions of Fancy, wonder-fraught!
Imagination unconfined!
Temples of mystery! behind
Whose veils the God-appointed plan
In perfect wisdom is enshrined,
Beyond the pigmy reach of man:
I cannot--dare not--seek to know
What finite vision, to the end,
Through years of strictest search below,
Must ever fail to comprehend!
God! whose intents so far transcend
Our poor discernment, let me see
Some portion of the truths that tend
By slow gradations up to Thee:
That in the less imperfect years,
When human frailty shall have died,
When the vexed riddle of the spheres,
Interpreted and glorified,
Shall be as nothing to the tide
Of light in which Thy hidden ways
Will be revealed: I may abide
Thy meanest instrument of praise,
And from the broad calm ocean of Thy truth
And wisdom drinking, find eternal youth.
{109}
LOVE AND TRUTH.
Young Love sat in a rosy bower,
Towards the close of a summer day;
At the evening's dusky hour,
Truth bent her blessed steps that way;
Over her face
Beaming a grace
Never bestowed on child of clay.
Truth looked on with an ardent joy,
Wondering Love could grow so tired;
Hovering o'er him she kissed the boy,
When, with a sudden impulse fired,
Exquisite pains
Burning his veins,
Wildly he woke, as one inspired.
Eagerly Truth embraced the god,
Filling his soul with a sense divine;
Rightly he knew the paths she trod,
Springing from heaven's royal line;
Far had he strayed
From his guardian maid,
Perilling all for his rash design.
Still as they went, the tricksy youth
Wandered afar from the maiden fair;
Many a plot he laid, in sooth,
Wherein the maid could have no share
Sowing his seeds,
Bringing forth weeds,
Seldom a rose, and many a tare.
{110}
Save when the maiden was by his side,
Love was erratic, and rarely true;
When she smiled on the graceful bride,
Over the old world rose the new,
Into life's skies
Blending her dyes,
Fairer than those of the rainbow's hue.
Sunny-eyed maidens, whom Love decoys,
Mark well the arts of the wayward youth!
Sorrows he bringeth, disguised as joys,
Rose-hued delights with cores of ruth;
Learn to believe
Love will deceive,
Save when he comes with his guardian, Truth.
{111}
THE WREN.
Early each spring the little wren
Came scolding to his nest of moss;
We knew him by his peevish cry,
He always sung so very cross.
His quiet little mate would lay
Her eggs in peace, and think all day.
He was a sturdy little wren;
And when he came in spring, we knew,
Or seemed to know, the flowers would grow
To please him, where they always grew,
Among the rushes, cheerfully;
But not a rush so straight as he!
All summer long that little wren
Would chatter like a saucy thing;
And in the bush attack the thrush
That on the hawthorn perched to sing.
Like many noisy little men,
Lived, bragged, and fought that little wren.
There was a thoughtful maid, and I,
We used to play along the shore,
Searching for shells, and culling flowers,
As at the threshold of life's door,
Through which we had to pass, we stood,
Twin types of childish hardihood.
{112}
Year after year we gathered flowers,
And grew apace, as children do;
And each returning spring we marked
The little wrens, they never grew;
One over-quiet and sedate,
The other, a bird-reprobate.
But now the marsh is overflowed,
The rushes rot beneath the sand;
No spring brings back the little wrens,
No children loiter hand in hand;
The maiden rose-bud, pure and good,
Grown to the flower of womanhood.
{113}
GRANDPERE.
Old Grandpere gat in the corner,
With his grandchild on his knee,
Looking up at his wrinkled visage,
For his winters were ninety-three.
Fair Eleanor's locks were flaxen,
The old man's once were gray,
But now, they were white as the snow-drift
That lay on the bleak highway.
Her summers rolled on as golden
As waves over sunny seas;
But Grandpere could perceive no summers,
The winters alone were his.
He folded his arms around her,
Like Winter embracing Spring;
And the angels looked down from heaven,
And smiled on their slumbering.
But soon the angelic faces
Were filled with seraphic light,
As they gazed on a beauteous spirit
Passing up through the frosty night:
Till it stood serene before them,
A youth most divinely fair;
And they saw that the new-born angel
Was the spirit of old Grandpere.
{114}
ENGLAND'S HOPE AND ENGLAND'S HEIR.
England's Hope and England's Heir!
Head and crown of Britain's glory,
Be thy future half so fair
As her past is famed in story,
Then wilt thou be great, indeed,
Daring, where there's cause to dare;
Greatest in the hour of need,
England's Hope and England's Heir.
By her past, in acts supreme,
By her present grand endeavour,
By her future, which the gleam
Of our fond hopes brings us ever:
We can trust that thou wilt be
Worthy of a fame so rare,
Worthy of thy destiny,
England's Hope and England's Heir.
Be thy spirit fraught with hers,
Queen, whom we revere and honour;
Be thine acts love's messengers,
Brightly flashing back upon her;
Be what most her trust would deem,
Help the answer to her prayer,
Realize her holiest dream,
England's Hope and England's Heir.
Welcome, Prince! the land is wide,
Wider still the love we cherish;
Love that thou shalt find, when tried,
Is not born to droop and perish;
{115}
Welcome to our heart of hearts;
You will find no falsehood there,
But the zeal that truth imparts,
England's Hope and England's Heir.
Welcome to our woodland deeps,
To our inland lakes, and rivers,
Where the rapid roars and sweeps,
Where the brightest sunlight quivers.
Loyal souls can never fail;
Serfdom crouches in its lair;
But our British hearts are hale,
England's Hope and England's Heir.
{116}
ROSE.
When the evening broods quiescent
Over mountain, vale and lea,
And the moon uplifts her crescent
Far above the peaceful sea,
Little Rose, the fisher's daughter,
Passes in her cedar skiff
O'er the dreamy waste of water,
To the signal on the cliff.
Have a care, my merry maiden!
Young Adonis though he be,
Many hearts are secret-laden
That have trusted such as he.
Has he worth, and is he truthful?
Thoughtless maiden rarely knows;
But, "He's handsome, brave and youthful,"
Says the heart of little Rose.
Hark! the horn--its shrill vibrations
Tremble through the maiden's breast,
As the sweet reverberations
Dwindle to their whispered rest;
Sweeter far the honied sentence
Sealing up her mind's repose;
Love as yet needs no repentance
In the heart of little Rose.
Heaven shield thee, trusting mortal!
Love has heaved its firstborn sigh;
But from the pellucid portal
Of her calm, indignant eye,
{117}
Darts that make the strong man tremble
Pierce his bosom ere he goes;
Rank and station may dissemble,
There is truth in little Rose.
Take my hand, my fisher maiden,
There's a grasp for thee and thine;
Constancy is love's bright Aiden,
Self-denial is divine.
Take my hand upon this pláteau,
Let me share thy mortal throes;
Come, dear Love! we'll build our cháteau
In the heart of little Rose.
{118}
THE DREAMER.
Spirit of Song! whose whispers
Delight my pensive brain,
When will the perfect harmony
Ring through my feeble strain?
When will the rills of melody
Be widened to a stream!
When will the bright and gladsome Day
Succeed this morning dream?
"Mortal," the spirit whispered,
"If thou wouldst truly win
The race thou art pursuing,
Heed well the voice within:
And it shall gently teach thee
To read thy heart, and know
No human strain is perfect,
However sweet it flow.
And if thou readest truly,
As surely shalt thou find
That truths, like rills, though diverse,
Are choicest in their kind.
The souls of Poet-Dreamers
Touch heaven on their way;
With the light of Song to guide them
It should be always Day."
{119}
NIGHT AND MORNING.
The winds are piping loud to-night,
And the waves roll strong and high;
God pity the watchful mariner
Who toils 'neath yonder sky!
I saw the vessel speed away,
With a free, majestic sweep,
At evening as the sun went down
To his palace in the deep.
An aged crone sat on the beach,
And, pointing to the ship,
"She'll never return again," she said,
With a scorn upon her lip.
------
The morning rose tempestuous,
The winds blew to the shore,
There were corpses on the sands that morn,
But the ship came nevermore!
{120}
WITHIN THINE EYES.
Within thine eyes two spirits dwell,
The sweetest and the purest
That ever wove Love's mystic spell,
Or plied his arts the surest:
No smile of morn,
Though heaven-born,
Nor sunshine earthward straying,
E'er charmed the sight
With half the light
That round thy lips is playing.
The stars may shine, the moon may smile,
The earth in beauty languish,
Life's sorrows these can but beguile,
But thou canst heal its anguish.
Thy voice, like rills
Of silver, trills
Such sounds of liquid sweetness,
Each accent rolls
Along our souls,
In lyrical completeness.
If Friendship lend thee such a grace,
That men nor gods may slight it,
How blest the one who views thy face
When Love comes down to light it!
And, oh, if he
Who holds in fee
Thy beauty, truth, and reason,
A traitor prove
To thee and Love,
We'll spurn him for his treason.
{121}
GERTRUDE.
Underneath the maple-tree
Gertrude worked her filigree,
All the summer long;
To sweet airs her voice was wed,
As she plied her golden thread;
Echo stealing through the grove
Filched away the words of love,
And the birds, from tree to tree,
Bore the witching melody
Through avenues of Song.
Underneath the maple-trees
Zephyrs chant her melodies,
All the summer long;
Words and airs no longer wed,
Death has snapped the vocal thread
Echo sleeping in the grove
Dreams of liquid airs of love,
And the birds among the trees
Fill with sweetest symphonies
Whole avenues of Song.
{122}
FLOWERS.
Thank God I love the Flowers!
Mute voices of the Spring,
That gladden all her bowers
With their varied blossoming;
They weave a charm around them
On each summer dale and bough,
For a Fairy train has bound them
In wreaths upon her brow.
Far up along the mountain,
And in the valleys green,
In the field, and by the fountain,
The smiling ones are seen;
Some looking up to heaven,
With eyes of deepest blue;
Some stooping down at even
To quaff the sparkling dew.
And from them all there speaketh
A language sweet and pure,
Fitted for him who seeketh
A God's nomenclature.
As tidal pulses thrill the seas,
And moments build the hours,
Heaven breathes her unvoiced mysteries
In sermons from the Flowers.
{123}
THE UNATTAINABLE.
I yearn for the Unattainable;
For a glimpse of a brighter day,
When hatred and strife,
With their legions rife,
Shall forever have passed away;
When pain shall cease,
And the dawn of peace
Come down from heaven above,
And man can meet his fellow-man
In the spirit of Christian Love.
I yearn for the Unattainable;
For a Voice that may long be still,
To compel the mind,
As heaven designed,
To work the Eternal Will;
When the brute that sleeps
In the heart's still deeps
Will be changed to Pity's dove,
And man can meet his fellow-man
In the spirit of Perfect Love.
{124}
YEARNINGS.
I long for diviner regions,--
The spirit would reach its goal;
Though, this world hath surpassing beauty,
It warreth against the soul.
There's a cloud in the eastern heaven;
Beyond it, a cold gray sky;
But I know that the sun's rare radiance
Will brighten it by and by.
In the fane of my soul is glowing
The joy of a hope to come,
That will touch with its Memnon finger
The lips that are cold and dumb:
Till illumed by the smile of heaven,
And blest with a purer life,
Will the gloom that o'ershades my spirit
Depart like a vanquished strife.
{125}
INGRATITUDE.
Full on the wave the moonlight weeps,
To quiet its weary breast;
Cruelly cold the mad wave leaps,
With the moonshine on its crest;
Or with scowl, or growl, to the shore it creeps,
And sinks to its selfish rest.
Full on yon man-brute smiles the wife,
To gladden his turbid breast;
Savagely stern he seeks the life
Where he erewhile sought for zest;
With a curse, or worse, he ends the strife,
And sinks to his drunken rest.
Sea! has the moon no charms for thee
That can touch thy cruel breast?
Man! cannot woman's charity
Give ease to thy soul oppressed?
Thou shalt flee, O sea! the moon's witchery,
Till man has his final rest!
{126}
TRUE LOVE.