THE shadowy semblance, lo! is past!
Loudly yells the midnight blast,
And, hark! the death-bell's sullen toll
Strikes upon my shrinking soul!
Whither, whither am I led ?
"To the drear caverns of the dead.
Here with murder shalt thou dwell;
Mark yon bleeding phantom well:
Know you not the wound you gave,
You was bloody, he was brave;
In the dark you dealt the blow,
With a hatchet fell'd him low,
His cleft head distended wide,
Hideous hangs upon each side.
Why dost thou enwrithing start,
'Gainst thy ribs why knocks thy heart?
Why, to the taper's glimmering blue,
Gleams thy front with clammy dew?
Welcome to his cell below,
Thou with thy murder'd host must go!"
Mercy, Mercy, do not clasp
My frame in such a frozen grasp ;
Fibres from my heart you tear,
Loose me, loose me, spectre drear;
Oh! ten thousand fathoms deep
I behold a vap❜ry steep,
Wild with ecstacy of pain,
Madness rushes on my brain,
Round and round my senses tost,
Now I tumble-I am lost.
WRITTEN IN A BURIAL PLACE.
AH me! and must I, like the tenant lie
Of this dark cell, all hush'd the witching song,
And will not. Feeling bend his streaming eye
On my green sod, as slow he wends along,
And, smiting his rapt bosom, softly sigh,
"His genius soar'd above the vulgar throng!",
Will he not fence my weedless turf around,
Sacred from dull-ey'd Folly's vagrant feet,
And there, soft-swelling in aerial sound,
Will he not list, at eve, to voices sweet,
Strew with the spring's first flow'rs the little mound,
And often muse within the lone retreat!
Yes;-though I not affect th' immortal bay,
Nor bold effusions of the learned quill,
Nor often have I wound my tedious way
Up the steep summit of the Muse's hill,
Yet sometimes have I pour'd th' incondite lay,
And sometimes have I felt the rapt'rous thrill;
Him therefore, whom ev'n once, the sacred Muse
Has blest, shall be to feeling ever dear,
And soft as sweet sad April's gleamy dews,
On my cold clay shall fall the genial tear,
While pensive as the springing herb he views,
He cries, "Though mute, there is a poet here!"
FOR that thou, once, didst lend a poet aid,
And from the green lamp of thy glaring eye,
Didst to divine Torquato* light supply,
When penury around diffus'd her shade,
Illustrious shalt thou live in lofty song;
Full well dost thou deserve immortal praise,
Whose influence beam'd on such delightful lays ;
Go, then, and soar above the vulgar throng,
And close to Virgo shine, a feline star !
And as the rolling spheres shall turn around,
Still sweetly purr to the ecstatic sound,
By astronomic sages ken'd afar ;
Though, darkling, pregnant with poetic dream,
Ah! never may I need thy virid gleam!
*Tasso, of whom this tradition is recorded.
Why persecutest thou me, Saul? ¡
"NECESSITY, thou mother of Invention, (Which proverb comes, I own, quite smooth in
Firing full many a rogue to claim a pension,
And o'er the rugged alps of Satire climb,
Forcing with goose-quill stabs, and tuneful curses,
The mighty men to stand, and lend their purses;
Why stick thus bur-like to the minstrel-crew,
So harmless, meek, and such damn'd bankrupts too?
All worth in this here place below is us'd
Worse than a pickpocket, knock'd down, abus'd
By every strutting blackguard Major Sturgeon,
And thou attendest him by way of surgeon.
Folly, dull dog, is fat, and sprucely drest,
And holds of surly Wealth the golden keys;
While Wit, poor, merry fellow, nought surveys,
But mice and mangled lyrics in his chest:
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