Press mine enamour'd spirit to thy breast, That I may melt into thee, and inhale Through all my nature thy mysterious balm, And rise upon thy wings
From out the lowness of this earthly self, To that ideal land
Where changeless beauty reigns.
The spell is on my soul:
I feel thy power around me like a sea, A waveless and illimitable sea,
That lifts me from myself,
And bears me onward, onward, far away, With swiftness passing thought, To that ethereal land.
They rise in dim array,
The beings of that inner world arise, The forms of cherish'd things,
Not as on earth beheld
But robed in that aerial loveliness
Which memory steals from heaven.
The vision opens-I behold
A ship, slow moving on its tranquil way Across the nightly main.
The lights of eve are fading in the west, And from the east looks forth
The yellow-blushing moon,
Tinging the pale grey clouds and far-seen wave With her own glowing hue.
Upon the deck two youthful forms appear, One, in whose virgin breast
A woman's heart hath just begun to beat ; Her cheek is passing fair, and in her eye A still and pensive grace, Attempering youth's fresh light,
The vision fades in air:
Another scene appears,
A fair and stately room,
On whose high roof and pictured walls the sun
Looks in with soften'd light.
Amidst that gentle gloom
A lady sits, with melancholy eyes,
And locks of faded gold,
Shading a wan and sorrow-wasted brow. Wo for that maiden! a heart-withering law Hath laid its iron hand
Upon her youthful spirit; she hath learnt The self-tormentor's love, and hath resign'd The natural joys of youth,
And social bliss, and the dear solaces Of woman's love to woman,— -so to please A God of boundless mercy, so to wean Her heart from earthly things.
And there she sits, her eyes fix'd vacantly Upon that open page; her thoughts the while Holding strange warfare with mysterious fears, The spectres of the soul,
That haunt its dark eclipse.
But see, she smiles! a hand unseen Hath touch'd the springs of tender memory; Her early years return-she is again A simple happy child;
The once-loved rural home
Is there, its closely-woven shade of trees, Its walks and garden-bowers; and they are there, Her young companions--they with whom she shared Her prayers, her tasks, her sports; within whose arms She slept so peacefully—
All, all returns-the woodland roam, the book That pleas'd her childish thought, The festal dance, the song, the merry eve Spent by the winter fire; or, sweeter yet, Like the soft mist around some rising star; An exhalation from the soul within, Where lofty thoughts and deep affections live Sleepless, but silent still.
A youth is with her, on whose brow Hope, and the manliness of calm resolve, And self-respect, sit blended; his fond eye Is fix'd on that dear sister, and his hand Is lock'd in her's; and now they commune hold, Few words, but full of thought, Of that far foreign land, and of the friends Who wait them there, and the beloved land They left behind: and by their side are seen Two children fair, one full of infant mirth, Tempting with many a wile
His grave-eyed brother's mood, Still sporting round him, as the lamb Sports round its mother in the sunny mead. The solitary kiss
LINES ON MEETING MISS ELIZA RIVERS IN A COACH.
Nympha, decus fluviorum, animo gratissima nostra.-VIRG.
My heart it was sad, and my brain it was dry,
When I met that dear maid in the Cambridgeshire Fly; And a soul-sinking chill of despondence came o'er me, As I gaz'd on the long weary desert before me.
But her life-breathing smile and her young joyous eye Came to me, like hope newly-lighted from high; I drank in her accents-and sorrow and care Dispers'd, like the mists in the bright summer air.
We talk'd and we travell'd-six hours by the chime, We travell'd and talk'd but we knew not the time; For our thoughts were in tune with the gay sunny weather, And the wheels and the argument jogg'd on together.
We talk'd and we travell'd-our talk to rehearse (The damsel's at least) it would puzzle my verse; For the heart and the soul would be wanting, that shed A light, like spring sunshine, on all that she said!
Farewell, merry maiden! but often, I ween,
In the short leisure moments of life's busy scene,
When the thoughts are at doze between sleeping and waking, And the heart plays with fantasies of its own making;
To my world-weary spirit the thought of those hours Shall rise, like the fragrance of far-distant flowers; And I'll think of the smile, and the voice, and the eye, Of her whom I met in the Cambridgeshire Fly.
SIR Hilary charged at Agincourt, Sooth! 'twas an awful day!
And though, in that old age of sport, The rufflers of the camp and court Had little time to pray,
'Tis said Sir Hilary muttered there Two syllables by way of prayer.
My first to all the brave and proud Who see to-morrow's sun;
My next, with her cold and quiet cloud, To those who find their dewy shroud, Before to-day's be done!
And both together to all blue eyes That weep when a warrior nobly dies!
My first, in torrents bleak and black, Was rushing from the sky, When, with my second at his back, Young Cupid wandered by ;
"Now take me in, the moon hath past, I pray ye take me in!
The lightnings flash, the hail falls fast, All Hades rides the thunder-blast; I'm dripping to the skin!"
"I know thee well, thy songs and sighs; A wicked god thou art,
And yet most welcome to the eyes, Most witching to the heart!" The Wanderer prayed another prayer, And shook his drooping wing;
The Lover bade him enter there,
And wrung my first from out his hair, And dried my second's string.
And therefore-(so the urchin swore, By Styx, the fearful river,
And by the shafts his quiver bore, And by his shining quiver,)
That Lover, aye, shall see my whole
In Life's tempestuous Heaven;
And, when the lightnings cease to roll,
Shall fix on me his dreaming soul
In the deep calm of even!
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