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diff --git a/old/ohp0110.txt b/old/ohp0110.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b4fcd89 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/ohp0110.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2412 @@ +Project Gutenberg EBook The Poetical Works of O. W. Holmes, Volume 1. +Earlier Poems (1830-1836) +#15 in our series by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers***** + + + +Title: The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes + Earlier Poems (1830-1836) + +Author: Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. + +Release Date: January, 2005 [Etext #7388] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[Most recently updated: April 22, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + + + + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POETRY OF O. W. HOLMES, V1 *** + + + +This eBook was produced by David Widger [widger@cecomet.net] + + + + + + THE POETICAL WORKS + + OF + + OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES + + + 1893 + (Printed in three volumes) + + +CONTENTS + +TO MY READERS + +EARLIER POEMS (1830-1836). + OLD IRONSIDES + THE LAST LEAF + THE CAMBRIDGE CHURCHYARD + TO AN INSECT + THE DILEMMA + MY AUNT + REFLECTIONS OF A PROUD PEDESTRIAN + DAILY TRIALS, BY A SENSITIVE MAN + EVENING, BY A TAILOR + THE DORCHESTER GIANT + TO THE PORTRAIT OF "A LADY" + THE COMET + THE Music-GRINDERS + THE TREADMILL SONG + THE SEPTEMBER GALE + THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS + THE LAST READER + POETRY : A METRICAL ESSAY + + + + +TO MY READERS + +NAY, blame me not; I might have spared +Your patience many a trivial verse, +Yet these my earlier welcome shared, +So, let the better shield the worse. + +And some might say, "Those ruder songs +Had freshness which the new have lost; +To spring the opening leaf belongs, +The chestnut-burs await the frost." + +When those I wrote, my locks were brown, +When these I write--ah, well a-day! +The autumn thistle's silvery down +Is not the purple bloom of May + +Go, little book, whose pages hold +Those garnered years in loving trust; +How long before your blue and gold +Shall fade and whiten in the dust? + +O sexton of the alcoved tomb, +Where souls in leathern cerements lie, +Tell me each living poet's doom! +How long before his book shall die? + +It matters little, soon or late, +A day, a month, a year, an age,-- +I read oblivion in its date, +And Finis on its title-page. + +Before we sighed, our griefs were told; +Before we smiled, our joys were sung; +And all our passions shaped of old +In accents lost to mortal tongue. + +In vain a fresher mould we seek,-- +Can all the varied phrases tell +That Babel's wandering children speak +How thrushes sing or lilacs smell? + +Caged in the poet's lonely heart, +Love wastes unheard its tenderest tone; +The soul that sings must dwell apart, +Its inward melodies unknown. + +Deal gently with us, ye who read +Our largest hope is unfulfilled,-- +The promise still outruns the deed,-- +The tower, but not the spire, we build. + +Our whitest pearl we never find; +Our ripest fruit we never reach; +The flowering moments of the mind +Drop half their petals in our speech. + +These are my blossoms; if they wear +One streak of morn or evening's glow, +Accept them; but to me more fair +The buds of song that never blow. +April 8, 1862. + + + + + + EARLIER POEMS + + 1830-1836 OLD IRONSIDES + +This was the popular name by which the frigate Constitution +was known. The poem was first printed in the Boston Daily +Advertiser, at the time when it was proposed to break up the +old ship as unfit for service. I subjoin the paragraph which +led to the writing of the poem. It is from the Advertiser of +Tuesday, September 14, 1830:-- + +"Old Ironsides.--It has been affirmed upon good authority +that the Secretary of the Navy has recommended to the Board of +Navy Commissioners to dispose of the frigate Constitution. Since +it has been understood that such a step was in contemplation we +have heard but one opinion expressed, and that in decided +disapprobation of the measure. Such a national object of interest, +so endeared to our national pride as Old Ironsides is, should +never by any act of our government cease to belong to the Navy, +so long as our country is to be found upon the map of nations. +In England it was lately determined by the Admiralty to cut the +Victory, a one-hundred gun ship (which it will be recollected bore +the flag of Lord Nelson at the battle of Trafalgar,) down to a +seventy-four, but so loud were the lamentations of the people upon +the proposed measure that the intention was abandoned. We +confidently anticipate that the Secretary of the Navy will in like +manner consult the general wish in regard to the Constitution, and +either let her remain in ordinary or rebuild her whenever the +public service may require."--New York Journal of Commerce. + +The poem was an impromptu outburst of feeling and was published +on the next day but one after reading the above paragraph. + +AY, tear her tattered ensign down +Long has it waved on high, +And many an eye has danced to see +That banner in the sky; +Beneath it rung the battle shout, +And burst the cannon's roar;-- +The meteor of the ocean air +Shall sweep the clouds no more. + +Her deck, once red with heroes' blood, +Where knelt the vanquished foe, +When winds were hurrying o'er the flood, +And waves were white below, +No more shall feel the victor's tread, +Or know the conquered knee;-- +The harpies of the shore shall pluck +The eagle of the sea! + +Oh better that her shattered hulk +Should sink beneath the wave; +Her thunders shook the mighty deep, +And there should be her grave; +Nail to the mast her holy flag, +Set every threadbare sail, +And give her to the god of storms, +The lightning and the gale! + + + + + +THE LAST LEAF + +This poem was suggested by the appearance in one of our +streets of a venerable relic of the Revolution, said to be one +of the party who threw the tea overboard in Boston Harbor. He +was a fine monumental specimen in his cocked hat and knee +breeches, with his buckled shoes and his sturdy cane. The smile +with which I, as a young man, greeted him, meant no disrespect to +an honored fellow-citizen whose costume was out of date, but whose +patriotism never changed with years. I do not recall any earlier +example of this form of verse, which was commended by the fastidious +Edgar Allan Poe, who made a copy of the whole poem which I have +in his own handwriting. Good Abraham Lincoln had a great liking +for the poem, and repeated it from memory to Governor Andrew, +as the governor himself told me. + +I SAW him once before, +As he passed by the door, +And again +The pavement stones resound, +As he totters o'er the ground +With his cane. + +They say that in his prime, +Ere the pruning-knife of Time +Cut him down, +Not a better man was found +By the Crier on his round +Through the town. + +But now he walks the streets, +And he looks at all he meets +Sad and wan, +And he shakes his feeble head, +That it seems as if he said, +"They are gone." + +The mossy marbles rest +On the lips that he has prest +In their bloom, +And the names he loved to hear +Have been carved for many a year +On the tomb. + +My grandmamma has said-- +Poor old lady, she is dead +Long ago-- +That he had a Roman nose, +And his cheek was like a rose +In the snow. + +But now his nose is thin, +And it rests upon his chin +Like a staff, +And a crook is in his back, +And a melancholy crack +In his laugh. + +I know it is a sin +For me to sit and grin +At him here; +But the old three-cornered hat, +And the breeches, and all that, +Are so queer! + +And if I should live to be +The last leaf upon the tree +In the spring, +Let them smile, as I do now, +At the old forsaken bough +Where I cling. + + + + + +THE CAMBRIDGE CHURCHYARD + +OUR ancient church! its lowly tower, +Beneath the loftier spire, +Is shadowed when the sunset hour +Clothes the tall shaft in fire; +It sinks beyond the distant eye +Long ere the glittering vane, +High wheeling in the western sky, +Has faded o'er the plain. + +Like Sentinel and Nun, they keep +Their vigil on the green; +One seems to guard, and one to weep, +The dead that lie between; +And both roll out, so full and near, +Their music's mingling waves, +They shake the grass, whose pennoned spear +Leans on the narrow graves. + +The stranger parts the flaunting weeds, +Whose seeds the winds have strown +So thick, beneath the line he reads, +They shade the sculptured stone; +The child unveils his clustered brow, +And ponders for a while +The graven willow's pendent bough, +Or rudest cherub's smile. + +But what to them the dirge, the knell? +These were the mourner's share,-- +The sullen clang, whose heavy swell +Throbbed through the beating air; +The rattling cord, the rolling stone, +The shelving sand that slid, +And, far beneath, with hollow tone +Rung on the coffin's lid. + +The slumberer's mound grows fresh and green, +Then slowly disappears; +The mosses creep, the gray stones lean, +Earth hides his date and years; +But, long before the once-loved name +Is sunk or worn away, +No lip the silent dust may claim, +That pressed the breathing clay. + +Go where the ancient pathway guides, +See where our sires laid down +Their smiling babes, their cherished brides, +The patriarchs of the town; +Hast thou a tear for buried love? +A sigh for transient power? +All that a century left above, +Go, read it in an hour! + +The Indian's shaft, the Briton's ball, +The sabre's thirsting edge, +The hot shell, shattering in its fall, +The bayonet's rending wedge,-- +Here scattered death; yet, seek the spot, +No trace thine eye can see, +No altar,--and they need it not +Who leave their children free! + +Look where the turbid rain-drops stand +In many a chiselled square; +The knightly crest, the shield, the brand +Of honored names were there;-- +Alas! for every tear is dried +Those blazoned tablets knew, +Save when the icy marble's side +Drips with the evening dew. + +Or gaze upon yon pillared stone, +The empty urn of pride; +There stand the Goblet and the Sun,-- +What need of more beside? +Where lives the memory of the dead, +Who made their tomb a toy? +Whose ashes press that nameless bed? +Go, ask the village boy! + +Lean o'er the slender western wall, +Ye ever-roaming girls; +The breath that bids the blossom fall +May lift your floating curls, +To sweep the simple lines that tell +An exile's date and doom; +And sigh, for where his daughters dwell, +They wreathe the stranger's tomb. + +And one amid these shades was born, +Beneath this turf who lies, +Once beaming as the summer's morn, +That closed her gentle eyes; +If sinless angels love as we, +Who stood thy grave beside, +Three seraph welcomes waited thee, +The daughter, sister, bride + +I wandered to thy buried mound +When earth was hid below +The level of the glaring ground, +Choked to its gates with snow, +And when with summer's flowery waves +The lake of verdure rolled, +As if a Sultan's white-robed slaves +Had scattered pearls and gold. + +Nay, the soft pinions of the air, +That lift this trembling tone, +Its breath of love may almost bear +To kiss thy funeral stone; +And, now thy smiles have passed away, +For all the joy they gave, +May sweetest dews and warmest ray +Lie on thine early grave! + +When damps beneath and storms above +Have bowed these fragile towers, +Still o'er the graves yon locust grove +Shall swing its Orient flowers; +And I would ask no mouldering bust, +If e'er this humble line, +Which breathed a sigh o'er other's dust, +Might call a tear on mine. + + + + + +TO AN INSECT + +The Katydid is "a species of grasshopper found in the United +States, so called from the sound which it makes."--Worcester. +I used to hear this insect in Providence, Rhode Island, but I +do not remember hearing it in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where +I passed my boyhood. It is well known in other towns in the +neighborhood of Boston. + +I LOVE to hear thine earnest voice, +Wherever thou art hid, +Thou testy little dogmatist, +Thou pretty Katydid +Thou mindest me of gentlefolks,-- +Old gentlefolks are they,-- +Thou say'st an undisputed thing +In such a solemn way. + +Thou art a female, Katydid +I know it by the trill +That quivers through thy piercing notes, +So petulant and shrill; +I think there is a knot of you +Beneath the hollow tree,-- +A knot of spinster Katydids,--- +Do Katydids drink tea? + +Oh tell me where did Katy live, +And what did Katy do? +And was she very fair and young, +And yet so wicked, too? +Did Katy love a naughty man, +Or kiss more cheeks than one? +I warrant Katy did no more +Than many a Kate has done. + +Dear me! I'll tell you all about +My fuss with little Jane, +And Ann, with whom I used to walk +So often down the lane, +And all that tore their locks of black, +Or wet their eyes of blue,-- +Pray tell me, sweetest Katydid, +What did poor Katy do? + +Ah no! the living oak shall crash, +That stood for ages still, +The rock shall rend its mossy base +And thunder down the hill, +Before the little Katydid +Shall add one word, to tell +The mystic story of the maid +Whose name she knows so well. + +Peace to the ever-murmuring race! +And when the latest one +Shall fold in death her feeble wings +Beneath the autumn sun, +Then shall she raise her fainting voice, +And lift her drooping lid, +And then the child of future years +Shall hear what Katy did. + + + + + +THE DILEMMA + +Now, by the blessed Paphian queen, +Who heaves the breast of sweet sixteen; +By every name I cut on bark +Before my morning star grew dark; +By Hymen's torch, by Cupid's dart, +By all that thrills the beating heart; +The bright black eye, the melting blue,-- +I cannot choose between the two. + +I had a vision in my dreams;-- +I saw a row of twenty beams; +From every beam a rope was hung, +In every rope a lover swung; +I asked the hue of every eye +That bade each luckless lover die; +Ten shadowy lips said, heavenly blue, +And ten accused the darker hue. + +I asked a matron which she deemed +With fairest light of beauty beamed; +She answered, some thought both were fair,-- +Give her blue eyes and golden hair. +I might have liked her judgment well, +But, as she spoke, she rung the bell, +And all her girls, nor small nor few, +Came marching in,--their eyes were blue. + +I asked a maiden; back she flung +The locks that round her forehead hung, +And turned her eye, a glorious one, +Bright as a diamond in the sun, +On me, until beneath its rays +I felt as if my hair would blaze; +She liked all eyes but eyes of green; +She looked at me; what could she mean? + +Ah! many lids Love lurks between, +Nor heeds the coloring of his screen; +And when his random arrows fly, +The victim falls, but knows not why. +Gaze not upon his shield of jet, +The shaft upon the string is set; +Look not beneath his azure veil, +Though every limb were cased in mail. + +Well, both might make a martyr break +The chain that bound him to the stake; +And both, with but a single ray, +Can melt our very hearts away; +And both, when balanced, hardly seem +To stir the scales, or rock the beam; +But that is dearest, all the while, +That wears for us the sweetest smile. + + + + + +MY AUNT + +MY aunt! my dear unmarried aunt! +Long years have o'er her flown; +Yet still she strains the aching clasp +That binds her virgin zone; +I know it hurts her,--though she looks +As cheerful as she can; +Her waist is ampler than her life, +For life is but a span. + +My aunt! my poor deluded aunt! +Her hair is almost gray; +Why will she train that winter curl +In such a spring-like way? +How can she lay her glasses down, +And say she reads as well, +When through a double convex lens +She just makes out to spell? + +Her father--grandpapa I forgive +This erring lip its smiles-- +Vowed she should make the finest girl +Within a hundred miles; +He sent her to a stylish school; +'T was in her thirteenth June; +And with her, as the rules required, +"Two towels and a spoon." + +They braced my aunt against a board, +To make her straight and tall; +They laced her up, they starved her down, +To make her light and small; +They pinched her feet, they singed her hair, +They screwed it up with pins;-- +Oh never mortal suffered more +In penance for her sins. + +So, when my precious aunt was done, +My grandsire brought her back; +(By daylight, lest some rabid youth +Might follow on the track;) +"Ah!" said my grandsire, as he shook +Some powder in his pan, +"What could this lovely creature do +Against a desperate man!" + +Alas! nor chariot, nor barouche, +Nor bandit cavalcade, +Tore from the trembling father's arms +His all-accomplished maid. +For her how happy had it been +And Heaven had spared to me +To see one sad, ungathered rose +On my ancestral tree. + + + + + +REFLECTIONS OF A PROUD PEDESTRIAN + +I SAW the curl of his waving lash, +And the glance of his knowing eye, +And I knew that he thought he was cutting a dash, +As his steed went thundering by. + +And he may ride in the rattling gig, +Or flourish the Stanhope gay, +And dream that he looks exceeding big +To the people that walk in the way; + +But he shall think, when the night is still, +On the stable-boy's gathering numbers, +And the ghost of many a veteran bill +Shall hover around his slumbers; + +The ghastly dun shall worry his sleep, +And constables cluster around him, +And he shall creep from the wood-hole deep +Where their spectre eyes have found him! + +Ay! gather your reins, and crack your thong, +And bid your steed go faster; +He does not know, as he scrambles along, +That he has a fool for his master; + +And hurry away on your lonely ride, +Nor deign from the mire to save me; +I will paddle it stoutly at your side +With the tandem that nature gave me! + + + + + +DAILY TRIALS + +BY A SENSITIVE MAN + +OH, there are times +When all this fret and tumult that we hear +Do seem more stale than to the sexton's ear +His own dull chimes. + +Ding dong! ding dong! +The world is in a simmer like a sea +Over a pent volcano,--woe is me +All the day long! + +From crib to shroud! +Nurse o'er our cradles screameth lullaby, +And friends in boots tramp round us as we die, +Snuffling aloud. + +At morning's call +The small-voiced pug-dog welcomes in the sun, +And flea-bit mongrels, wakening one by one, +Give answer all. + +When evening dim +Draws round us, then the lonely caterwaul, +Tart solo, sour duet, and general squall,-- +These are our hymn. + +Women, with tongues +Like polar needles, ever on the jar; +Men, plugless word-spouts, whose deep fountains are +Within their lungs. + +Children, with drums +Strapped round them by the fond paternal ass; +Peripatetics with a blade of grass +Between their thumbs. + +Vagrants, whose arts +Have caged some devil in their mad machine, +Which grinding, squeaks, with husky groans between, +Come out by starts. + +Cockneys that kill +Thin horses of a Sunday,--men, with clams, +Hoarse as young bisons roaring for their dams +From hill to hill. + +Soldiers, with guns, +Making a nuisance of the blessed air, +Child-crying bellmen, children in despair, +Screeching for buns. + +Storms, thunders, waves! +Howl, crash, and bellow till ye get your fill; +Ye sometimes rest; men never can be still +But in their graves. + + + + + +EVENING + +BY A TAILOR + +DAY hath put on his jacket, and around +His burning bosom buttoned it with stars. +Here will I lay me on the velvet grass, +That is like padding to earth's meagre ribs, +And hold communion with the things about me. +Ah me! how lovely is the golden braid +That binds the skirt of night's descending robe! +The thin leaves, quivering on their silken threads, +Do make a music like to rustling satin, +As the light breezes smooth their downy nap. + +Ha! what is this that rises to my touch, +So like a cushion? Can it be a cabbage? +It is, it is that deeply injured flower, +Which boys do flout us with;--but yet I love thee, +Thou giant rose, wrapped in a green surtout. +Doubtless in Eden thou didst blush as bright +As these, thy puny brethren; and thy breath +Sweetened the fragrance of her spicy air; +But now thou seemest like a bankrupt beau, +Stripped of his gaudy hues and essences, +And growing portly in his sober garments. + +Is that a swan that rides upon the water? +Oh no, it is that other gentle bird, +Which is the patron of our noble calling. +I well remember, in my early years, +When these young hands first closed upon a goose; +I have a scar upon my thimble finger, +Which chronicles the hour of young ambition. +My father was a tailor, and his father, +And my sire's grandsire, all of them were tailors; +They had an ancient goose,--it was an heirloom +From some remoter tailor of our race. +It happened I did see it on a time +When none was near, and I did deal with it, +And it did burn me,--oh, most fearfully! + +It is a joy to straighten out one's limbs, +And leap elastic from the level counter, +Leaving the petty grievances of earth, +The breaking thread, the din of clashing shears, +And all the needles that do wound the spirit, +For such a pensive hour of soothing silence. +Kind Nature, shuffling in her loose undress, +Lays bare her shady bosom;--I can feel +With all around me;--I can hail the flowers +That sprig earth's mantle,--and yon quiet bird, +That rides the stream, is to me as a brother. +The vulgar know not all the hidden pockets, +Where Nature stows away her loveliness. +But this unnatural posture of the legs +Cramps my extended calves, and I must go +Where I can coil them in their wonted fashion. + + + + + +THE DORCHESTER GIANT + +The "pudding-stone" is a remarkable conglomerate found very +abundantly in the towns mentioned, all of which are in the neighborhood +of Boston. We used in those primitive days to ask friends to _ride_ +with us when we meant to take them to _drive_ with us. + +THERE was a giant in time of old, +A mighty one was he; +He had a wife, but she was a scold, +So he kept her shut in his mammoth fold; +And he had children three. + +It happened to be an election day, +And the giants were choosing a king +The people were not democrats then, +They did not talk of the rights of men, +And all that sort of thing. + +Then the giant took his children three, +And fastened them in the pen; +The children roared; quoth the giant, "Be still!" +And Dorchester Heights and Milton Hill +Rolled back the sound again. + +Then he brought them a pudding stuffed with plums, +As big as the State-House dome; +Quoth he, "There 's something for you to eat; +So stop your mouths with your 'lection treat, +And wait till your dad comes home." + +So the giant pulled him a chestnut stout, +And whittled the boughs away; +The boys and their mother set up a shout, +Said he, "You 're in, and you can't get out, +Bellow as loud as you may." + +Off he went, and he growled a tune +As he strode the fields along; +'T is said a buffalo fainted away, +And fell as cold as a lump of clay, +When he heard the giant's song. + +But whether the story 's true or not, +It is n't for me to show; +There 's many a thing that 's twice as queer +In somebody's lectures that we hear, +And those are true, you know. + +What are those lone ones doing now, +The wife and the children sad? +Oh, they are in a terrible rout, +Screaming, and throwing their pudding about, +Acting as they were mad. + +They flung it over to Roxbury hills, +They flung it over the plain, +And all over Milton and Dorchester too +Great lumps of pudding the giants threw; +They tumbled as thick as rain. + +Giant and mammoth have passed away, +For ages have floated by; +The suet is hard as a marrow-bone, +And every plum is turned to a stone, +But there the puddings lie. + +And if, some pleasant afternoon, +You 'll ask me out to ride, +The whole of the story I will tell, +And you shall see where the puddings fell, +And pay for the punch beside. + + + + + +TO THE PORTRAIT OF "A LADY" +IN THE ATHENAEUM GALLERY + +WELL, Miss, I wonder where you live, +I wonder what's your name, +I wonder how you came to be +In such a stylish frame; +Perhaps you were a favorite child, +Perhaps an only one; +Perhaps your friends were not aware +You had your portrait done + +Yet you must be a harmless soul; +I cannot think that Sin +Would care to throw his loaded dice, +With such a stake to win; +I cannot think you would provoke +The poet's wicked pen, +Or make young women bite their lips, +Or ruin fine young men. + +Pray, did you ever hear, my love, +Of boys that go about, +Who, for a very trifling sum, +Will snip one's picture out? +I'm not averse to red and white, +But all things have their place, +I think a profile cut in black +Would suit your style of face! + +I love sweet features; I will own +That I should like myself +To see my portrait on a wall, +Or bust upon a shelf; +But nature sometimes makes one up +Of such sad odds and ends, +It really might be quite as well +Hushed up among one's friends! + + + + + +THE COMET + +THE Comet! He is on his way, +And singing as he flies; +The whizzing planets shrink before +The spectre of the skies; +Ah! well may regal orbs burn blue, +And satellites turn pale, +Ten million cubic miles of head, +Ten billion leagues of tail! + +On, on by whistling spheres of light +He flashes and he flames; +He turns not to the left nor right, +He asks them not their names; +One spurn from his demoniac heel,-- +Away, away they fly, +Where darkness might be bottled up +And sold for "Tyrian dye." + +And what would happen to the land, +And how would look the sea, +If in the bearded devil's path +Our earth should chance to be? +Full hot and high the sea would boil, +Full red the forests gleam; +Methought I saw and heard it all +In a dyspeptic dream! + +I saw a tutor take his tube +The Comet's course to spy; +I heard a scream,--the gathered rays +Had stewed the tutor's eye; +I saw a fort,--the soldiers all +Were armed with goggles green; +Pop cracked the guns! whiz flew the balls! +Bang went the magazine! + +I saw a poet dip a scroll +Each moment in a tub, +I read upon the warping back, +"The Dream of Beelzebub;" +He could not see his verses burn, +Although his brain was fried, +And ever and anon he bent +To wet them as they dried. + +I saw the scalding pitch roll down +The crackling, sweating pines, +And streams of smoke, like water-spouts, +Burst through the rumbling mines; +I asked the firemen why they made +Such noise about the town; +They answered not,--but all the while +The brakes went up and down. + +I saw a roasting pullet sit +Upon a baking egg; +I saw a cripple scorch his hand +Extinguishing his leg; +I saw nine geese upon the wing +Towards the frozen pole, +And every mother's gosling fell +Crisped to a crackling coal. + +I saw the ox that browsed the grass +Writhe in the blistering rays, +The herbage in his shrinking jaws +Was all a fiery blaze; +I saw huge fishes, boiled to rags, +Bob through the bubbling brine; +And thoughts of supper crossed my soul; +I had been rash at mine. + +Strange sights! strange sounds! Oh fearful dream! +Its memory haunts me still, +The steaming sea, the crimson glare, +That wreathed each wooded hill; +Stranger! if through thy reeling brain +Such midnight visions sweep, +Spare, spare, oh, spare thine evening meal, +And sweet shall be thy sleep! + + + + + +THE MUSIC-GRINDERS + +THERE are three ways in which men take +One's money from his purse, +And very hard it is to tell +Which of the three is worse; +But all of them are bad enough +To make a body curse. + +You're riding out some pleasant day, +And counting up your gains; +A fellow jumps from out a bush, +And takes your horse's reins, +Another hints some words about +A bullet in your brains. + +It's hard to meet such pressing friends +In such a lonely spot; +It's very hard to lose your cash, +But harder to be shot; +And so you take your wallet out, +Though you would rather not. + +Perhaps you're going out to dine,-- +Some odious creature begs +You'll hear about the cannon-ball +That carried off his pegs, +And says it is a dreadful thing +For men to lose their legs. + +He tells you of his starving wife, +His children to be fed, +Poor little, lovely innocents, +All clamorous for bread,-- +And so you kindly help to put +A bachelor to bed. + +You're sitting on your window-seat, +Beneath a cloudless moon; +You hear a sound, that seems to wear +The semblance of a tune, +As if a broken fife should strive +To drown a cracked bassoon. + +And nearer, nearer still, the tide +Of music seems to come, +There's something like a human voice, +And something like a drum; +You sit in speechless agony, +Until your ear is numb. + +Poor "home, sweet home" should seem to be +A very dismal place; +Your "auld acquaintance" all at once +Is altered in the face; +Their discords sting through Burns and Moore, +Like hedgehogs dressed in lace. + +You think they are crusaders, sent +From some infernal clime, +To pluck the eyes of Sentiment, +And dock the tail of Rhyme, +To crack the voice of Melody, +And break the legs of Time. + +But hark! the air again is still, +The music all is ground, +And silence, like a poultice, comes +To heal the blows of sound; +It cannot be,--it is,--it is,-- +A hat is going round! + +No! Pay the dentist when he leaves +A fracture in your jaw, +And pay the owner of the bear +That stunned you with his paw, +And buy the lobster that has had +Your knuckles in his claw; + +But if you are a portly man, +Put on your fiercest frown, +And talk about a constable +To turn them out of town; +Then close your sentence with an oath, +And shut the window down! + +And if you are a slender man, +Not big enough for that, +Or, if you cannot make a speech, +Because you are a flat, +Go very quietly and drop +A button in the hat! + + + + + +THE TREADMILL SONG + +THE stars are rolling in the sky, +The earth rolls on below, +And we can feel the rattling wheel +Revolving as we go. +Then tread away, my gallant boys, +And make the axle fly; +Why should not wheels go round about, +Like planets in the sky? + +Wake up, wake up, my duck-legged man, +And stir your solid pegs +Arouse, arouse, my gawky friend, +And shake your spider legs; +What though you're awkward at the trade, +There's time enough to learn,-- +So lean upon the rail, my lad, +And take another turn. + +They've built us up a noble wall, +To keep the vulgar out; +We've nothing in the world to do +But just to walk about; +So faster, now, you middle men, +And try to beat the ends,-- +It's pleasant work to ramble round +Among one's honest friends. + +Here, tread upon the long man's toes, +He sha'n't be lazy here,-- +And punch the little fellow's ribs, +And tweak that lubber's ear,-- +He's lost them both,--don't pull his hair, +Because he wears a scratch, +But poke him in the further eye, +That is n't in the patch. + +Hark! fellows, there 's the supper-bell, +And so our work is done; +It's pretty sport,--suppose we take +A round or two for fun! +If ever they should turn me out, +When I have better grown, +Now hang me, but I mean to have +A treadmill of my own! + + + + + +THE SEPTEMBER GALE + + This tremendous hurricane occurred on the 23d of September, 1815. + I remember it well, being then seven years old. A full account of + it was published, I think, in the records of the American Academy + of Arts and Sciences. Some of my recollections are given in The + Seasons, an article to be found in a book of mine entitled Pages + from an Old Volume of Life. + +I'M not a chicken; I have seen +Full many a chill September, +And though I was a youngster then, +That gale I well remember; +The day before, my kite-string snapped, +And I, my kite pursuing, +The wind whisked off my palm-leaf hat; +For me two storms were brewing! + +It came as quarrels sometimes do, +When married folks get clashing; +There was a heavy sigh or two, +Before the fire was flashing,-- +A little stir among the clouds, +Before they rent asunder,-- +A little rocking of the trees, +And then came on the thunder. + +Lord! how the ponds and rivers boiled! +They seemed like bursting craters! +And oaks lay scattered on the ground +As if they were p'taters; +And all above was in a howl, +And all below a clatter,-- +The earth was like a frying-pan, +Or some such hissing matter. + +It chanced to be our washing-day, +And all our things were drying; +The storm came roaring through the lines, +And set them all a flying; +I saw the shirts and petticoats +Go riding off like witches; +I lost, ah! bitterly I wept,-- +I lost my Sunday breeches! + +I saw them straddling through the air, +Alas! too late to win them; +I saw them chase the clouds, as if +The devil had been in them; +They were my darlings and my pride, +My boyhood's only riches,-- +"Farewell, farewell," I faintly cried,-- +"My breeches! Oh my breeches!" + +That night I saw them in my dreams, +How changed from what I knew them! +The dews had steeped their faded threads, +The winds had whistled through them +I saw the wide and ghastly rents +Where demon claws had torn them; +A hole was in their amplest part, +As if an imp had worn them. + +I have had many happy years, +And tailors kind and clever, +But those young pantaloons have gone +Forever and forever! +And not till fate has cut the last +Of all my earthly stitches, +This aching heart shall cease to mourn +My loved, my long-lost breeches! + + + + + +THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS + +I WROTE some lines once on a time +In wondrous merry mood, +And thought, as usual, men would say +They were exceeding good. + +They were so queer, so very queer, +I laughed as I would die; +Albeit, in the general way, +A sober man am I. + +I called my servant, and he came; +How kind it was of him +To mind a slender man like me, +He of the mighty limb. + +"These to the printer," I exclaimed, +And, in my humorous way, +I added, (as a trifling jest,) +"There'll be the devil to pay." + +He took the paper, and I watched, +And saw him peep within; +At the first line he read, his face +Was all upon the grin. + +He read the next; the grin grew broad, +And shot from ear to ear; +He read the third; a chuckling noise +I now began to hear. + +The fourth; he broke into a roar; +The fifth; his waistband split; +The sixth; he burst five buttons off, +And tumbled in a fit. + +Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye, +I watched that wretched man, +And since, I never dare to write +As funny as I can. + + + + + +THE LAST READER + +I SOMETIMES sit beneath a tree +And read my own sweet songs; +Though naught they may to others be, +Each humble line prolongs +A tone that might have passed away +But for that scarce remembered lay. + +I keep them like a lock or leaf +That some dear girl has given; +Frail record of an hour, as brief +As sunset clouds in heaven, +But spreading purple twilight still +High over memory's shadowed hill. + +They lie upon my pathway bleak, +Those flowers that once ran wild, +As on a father's careworn cheek +The ringlets of his child; +The golden mingling with the gray, +And stealing half its snows away. + +What care I though the dust is spread +Around these yellow leaves, +Or o'er them his sarcastic thread +Oblivion's insect weaves +Though weeds are tangled on the stream, +It still reflects my morning's beam. + +And therefore love I such as smile +On these neglected songs, +Nor deem that flattery's needless wile +My opening bosom wrongs; +For who would trample, at my side, +A few pale buds, my garden's pride? + +It may be that my scanty ore +Long years have washed away, +And where were golden sands before +Is naught but common clay; +Still something sparkles in the sun +For memory to look back upon. + +And when my name no more is heard, +My lyre no more is known, +Still let me, like a winter's bird, +In silence and alone, +Fold over them the weary wing +Once flashing through the dews of spring. + +Yes, let my fancy fondly wrap +My youth in its decline, +And riot in the rosy lap +Of thoughts that once were mine, +And give the worm my little store +When the last reader reads no more! + + + + + + POETRY: + + A METRICAL ESSAY, READ BEFORE THE PHI BETA KAPPA SOCIETY, + HARVARD UNIVERSITY, AUGUST, 1836 + + TO CHARLES WENTWORTH UPHAM, THE FOLLOWING METRICAL ESSAY IS +AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED. + +This Academic Poem presents the simple and partial views of a young +person trained after the schools of classical English verse as +represented by Pope, Goldsmith, and Campbell, with whose lines his +memory was early stocked. It will be observed that it deals chiefly with +the constructive side of the poet's function. That which makes him a +poet is not the power of writing melodious rhymes, it is not the +possession of ordinary human sensibilities nor even of both these +qualities in connection with each other. I should rather say, if I were +now called upon to define it, it is the power of transfiguring the +experiences and shows of life into an aspect which comes from his +imagination and kindles that of others. Emotion is its stimulus and +language furnishes its expression; but these are not all, as some might +infer was the doctrine of the poem before the reader. + +A common mistake made by young persons who suppose themselves to have +the poetical gift is that their own spiritual exaltation finds a true +expression in the conventional phrases which are borrowed from the +voices of the singers whose inspiration they think they share. + +Looking at this poem as an expression of some aspects of the /ars +poetica/, with some passages which I can read even at this mature period +of life without blushing for them, it may stand as the most serious +representation of my early efforts. Intended as it was for public +delivery, many of its paragraphs may betray the fact by their somewhat +rhetorical and sonorous character. + +SCENES of my youth! awake its slumbering fire! +Ye winds of Memory, sweep the silent lyre! +Ray of the past, if yet thou canst appear, +Break through the clouds of Fancy's waning year; +Chase from her breast the thin autumnal snow, +If leaf or blossom still is fresh below! + +Long have I wandered; the returning tide +Brought back an exile to his cradle's side; +And as my bark her time-worn flag unrolled, +To greet the land-breeze with its faded fold, +So, in remembrance of my boyhood's time, +I lift these ensigns of neglected rhyme; +Oh, more than blest, that, all my wanderings through, +My anchor falls where first my pennons flew! + + . . . . . . . . . + +The morning light, which rains its quivering beams +Wide o'er the plains, the summits, and the streams, +In one broad blaze expands its golden glow +On all that answers to its glance below; +Yet, changed on earth, each far reflected ray +Braids with fresh hues the shining brow of day; +Now, clothed in blushes by the painted flowers, +Tracks on their cheeks the rosy-fingered hours; +Now, lost in shades, whose dark entangled leaves +Drip at the noontide from their pendent eaves, +Fades into gloom, or gleams in light again +From every dew-drop on the jewelled plain. + + +We, like the leaf, the summit, or the wave, +Reflect the light our common nature gave, +But every sunbeam, falling from her throne, +Wears on our hearts some coloring of our own +Chilled in the slave, and burning in the free, +Like the sealed cavern by the sparkling sea; +Lost, like the lightning in the sullen clod, +Or shedding radiance, like the smiles of God; +Pure, pale in Virtue, as the star above, +Or quivering roseate on the leaves of Love; +Glaring like noontide, where it glows upon +Ambition's sands,--the desert in the sun,-- +Or soft suffusing o'er the varied scene +Life's common coloring,--intellectual green. + +Thus Heaven, repeating its material plan, +Arched over all the rainbow mind of man; +But he who, blind to universal laws, +Sees but effects, unconscious of their cause,-- +Believes each image in itself is bright, +Not robed in drapery of reflected light,-- +Is like the rustic who, amidst his toil, +Has found some crystal in his meagre soil, +And, lost in rapture, thinks for him alone +Earth worked her wonders on the sparkling stone, +Nor dreams that Nature, with as nice a line, +Carved countless angles through the boundless mine. + +Thus err the many, who, entranced to find +Unwonted lustre in some clearer mind, +Believe that Genius sets the laws at naught +Which chain the pinions of our wildest thought; +Untaught to measure, with the eye of art, +The wandering fancy or the wayward heart; +Who match the little only with the less, +And gaze in rapture at its slight excess, +Proud of a pebble, as the brightest gem +Whose light might crown an emperor's diadem. + +And, most of all, the pure ethereal fire +Which seems to radiate from the poet's lyre +Is to the world a mystery and a charm, +An AEgis wielded on a mortal's arm, +While Reason turns her dazzled eye away, +And bows her sceptre to her subject's sway; +And thus the poet, clothed with godlike state, +Usurped his Maker's title--to create; +He, whose thoughts differing not in shape, but dress, +What others feel more fitly can express, +Sits like the maniac on his fancied throne, +Peeps through the bars, and calls the world his own. + +There breathes no being but has some pretence +To that fine instinct called poetic sense +The rudest savage, roaming through the wild; +The simplest rustic, bending o'er his child; +The infant, listening to the warbling bird; +The mother, smiling at its half-formed word; +The boy uncaged, who tracks the fields at large; +The girl, turned matron to her babe-like charge; +The freeman, casting with unpurchased hand +The vote that shakes the turret of the land; +The slave, who, slumbering on his rusted chain, +Dreams of the palm-trees on his burning plain; +The hot-cheeked reveller, tossing down the wine, +To join the chorus pealing "Auld lang syne"; +The gentle maid, whose azure eye grows dim, +While Heaven is listening to her evening hymn; +The jewelled beauty, when her steps draw near +The circling dance and dazzling chandelier; +E'en trembling age, when Spring's renewing air +Waves the thin ringlets of his silvered hair;-- +All, all are glowing with the inward flame, +Whose wider halo wreathes the poet's name, +While, unenbalmed, the silent dreamer dies, +His memory passing with his smiles and sighs! + +If glorious visions, born for all mankind, +The bright auroras of our twilight mind; +If fancies, varying as the shapes that lie +Stained on the windows of the sunset sky; +If hopes, that beckon with delusive gleams, +Till the eye dances in the void of dreams; +If passions, following with the winds that urge +Earth's wildest wanderer to her farthest verge;-- +If these on all some transient hours bestow +Of rapture tingling with its hectic glow, +Then all are poets; and if earth had rolled +Her myriad centuries, and her doom were told, +Each moaning billow of her shoreless wave +Would wail its requiem o'er a poet's grave! + +If to embody in a breathing word +Tones that the spirit trembled when it heard; +To fix the image all unveiled and warm, +And carve in language its ethereal form, +So pure, so perfect, that the lines express +No meagre shrinking, no unlaced excess; +To feel that art, in living truth, has taught +Ourselves, reflected in the sculptured thought;-- +If this alone bestow the right to claim +The deathless garland and the sacred name, +Then none are poets save the saints on high, +Whose harps can murmur all that words deny! + +But though to none is granted to reveal +In perfect semblance all that each may feel, +As withered flowers recall forgotten love, +So, warmed to life, our faded passions move +In every line, where kindling fancy throws +The gleam of pleasures or the shade of woes. + +When, schooled by time, the stately queen of art +Had smoothed the pathways leading to the heart, +Assumed her measured tread, her solemn tone, +And round her courts the clouds of fable thrown, +The wreaths of heaven descended on her shrine, +And wondering earth proclaimed the Muse divine. +Yet if her votaries had but dared profane +The mystic symbols of her sacred reign, +How had they smiled beneath the veil to find +What slender threads can chain the mighty mind! + + +Poets, like painters, their machinery claim, +And verse bestows the varnish and the frame; +Our grating English, whose Teutonic jar +Shakes the racked axle of Art's rattling car, +Fits like mosaic in the lines that gird +Fast in its place each many-angled word; +From Saxon lips Anacreon's numbers glide, +As once they melted on the Teian tide, +And, fresh transfused, the Iliad thrills again +From Albion's cliffs as o'er Achaia's plain +The proud heroic, with, its pulse-like beat, +Rings like the cymbals clashing as they meet; +The sweet Spenserian, gathering as it flows, +Sweeps gently onward to its dying close, +Where waves on waves in long succession pour, +Till the ninth billow melts along the shore; +The lonely spirit of the mournful lay, +Which lives immortal as the verse of Gray, +In sable plumage slowly drifts along, +On eagle pinion, through the air of song; +The glittering lyric bounds elastic by, +With flashing ringlets and exulting eye, +While every image, in her airy whirl, +Gleams like a diamond on a dancing girl! + +Born with mankind, with man's expanded range +And varying fates the poet's numbers change; +Thus in his history may we hope to find +Some clearer epochs of the poet's mind, +As from the cradle of its birth we trace, +Slow wandering forth, the patriarchal race. + + + + I. + +When the green earth, beneath the zephyr's wing, +Wears on her breast the varnished buds of Spring; +When the loosed current, as its folds uncoil, +Slides in the channels of the mellowed soil; +When the young hyacinth returns to seek +The air and sunshine with her emerald beak; +When the light snowdrops, starting from their cells, +Hang each pagoda with its silver bells; +When the frail willow twines her trailing bow +With pallid leaves that sweep the soil below; +When the broad elm, sole empress of the plain, +Whose circling shadow speaks a century's reign, +Wreathes in the clouds her regal diadem,-- +A forest waving on a single stem;-- +Then mark the poet; though to him unknown +The quaint-mouthed titles, such as scholars own, +See how his eye in ecstasy pursues +The steps of Nature tracked in radiant hues; +Nay, in thyself, whate'er may be thy fate, +Pallid with toil or surfeited with state, +Mark how thy fancies, with the vernal rose, +Awake, all sweetness, from their long repose; +Then turn to ponder o'er the classic page, +Traced with the idyls of a greener age, +And learn the instinct which arose to warm +Art's earliest essay and her simplest form. + +To themes like these her narrow path confined +The first-born impulse moving in the mind; +In vales unshaken by the trumpet's sound, +Where peaceful Labor tills his fertile ground, +The silent changes of the rolling years, +Marked on the soil or dialled on the spheres, +The crested forests and the colored flowers, +The dewy grottos and the blushing bowers,-- +These, and their guardians, who, with liquid names, +Strephons and Chloes, melt in mutual flames, +Woo the young Muses from their mountain shade, +To make Arcadias in the lonely glade. + +Nor think they visit only with their smiles +The fabled valleys and Elysian isles; +He who is wearied of his village plain +May roam the Edens of the world in vain. +'T is not the star-crowned cliff, the cataract's flow, +The softer foliage or the greener glow, +The lake of sapphire or the spar-hung cave, +The brighter sunset or the broader wave, +Can warm his heart whom every wind has blown +To every shore, forgetful of his own. + +Home of our childhood! how affection clings +And hovers round thee with her seraph wings! +Dearer thy hills, though clad in autumn brown, +Than fairest summits which the cedars crown! +Sweeter the fragrance of thy summer breeze +Than all Arabia breathes along the seas! +The stranger's gale wafts home the exile's sigh, +For the heart's temple is its own blue sky! + +Oh happiest they, whose early love unchanged, +Hopes undissolved, and friendship unestranged, +Tired of their wanderings, still can deign to see +Love, hopes, and friendship, centring all in thee! + +And thou, my village! as again I tread +Amidst thy living and above thy dead; +Though some fair playmates guard with charter fears +Their cheeks, grown holy with the lapse of years; +Though with the dust some reverend locks may blend, +Where life's last mile-stone marks the journey's end; +On every bud the changing year recalls, +The brightening glance of morning memory falls, +Still following onward as the months unclose +The balmy lilac or the bridal rose; +And still shall follow, till they sink once more +Beneath the snow-drifts of the frozen shore, +As when my bark, long tossing in the gale, +Furled in her port her tempest-rended sail! + +What shall I give thee? Can a simple lay, +Flung on thy bosom like a girl's bouquet, +Do more than deck thee for an idle hour, +Then fall unheeded, fading like the flower? +Yet, when I trod, with footsteps wild and free, +The crackling leaves beneath yon linden-tree, +Panting from play or dripping from the stream, +How bright the visions of my boyish dream +Or, modest Charles, along thy broken edge, +Black with soft ooze and fringed with arrowy sedge, +As once I wandered in the morning sun, +With reeking sandal and superfluous gun, +How oft, as Fancy whispered in the gale, +Thou wast the Avon of her flattering tale! +Ye hills, whose foliage, fretted on the skies, +Prints shadowy arches on their evening dyes, +How should my song with holiest charm invest +Each dark ravine and forest-lifting crest! +How clothe in beauty each familiar scene, +Till all was classic on my native green! + +As the drained fountain, filled with autumn leaves, +The field swept naked of its garnered sheaves, +So wastes at noon the promise of our dawn, +The springs all choking, and the harvest gone. + +Yet hear the lay of one whose natal star +Still seemed the brightest when it shone afar; +Whose cheek, grown pallid with ungracious toil, +Glows in the welcome of his parent soil; +And ask no garlands sought beyond the tide, +But take the leaflets gathered at your side. + + + + II. + +But times were changed; the torch of terror came, +To light the summits with the beacon's flame; +The streams ran crimson, the tall mountain pines +Rose a new forest o'er embattled lines; +The bloodless sickle lent the warrior's steel, +The harvest bowed beneath his chariot wheel; +Where late the wood-dove sheltered her repose +The raven waited for the conflict's close; +The cuirassed sentry walked his sleepless round +Where Daphne smiled or Amaryllis frowned; +Where timid minstrels sung their blushing charms, +Some wild Tyrtaeus called aloud, "To arms!" + +When Glory wakes, when fiery spirits leap, +Roused by her accents from their tranquil sleep, +The ray that flashes from the soldier's crest +Lights, as it glances, in the poet's breast;-- +Not in pale dreamers, whose fantastic lay +Toys with smooth trifles like a child at play, +But men, who act the passions they inspire, +Who wave the sabre as they sweep the lyre! + +Ye mild enthusiasts, whose pacific frowns +Are lost like dew-drops caught in burning towns, +Pluck as ye will the radiant plumes of fame, +Break Caesar's bust to make yourselves a name; +But if your country bares the avenger's blade +For wrongs unpunished or for debts unpaid, +When the roused nation bids her armies form, +And screams her eagle through the gathering storm, +When from your ports the bannered frigate rides, +Her black bows scowling to the crested tides, +Your hour has past; in vain your feeble cry +As the babe's wailings to the thundering sky! + +Scourge of mankind! with all the dread array +That wraps in wrath thy desolating way, +As the wild tempest wakes the slumbering sea, +Thou only teachest all that man can be. +Alike thy tocsin has the power to charm +The toil-knit sinews of the rustic's arm, +Or swell the pulses in the poet's veins, +And bid the nations tremble at his strains. + +The city slept beneath the moonbeam's glance, +Her white walls gleaming through the vines of France, +And all was hushed, save where the footsteps fell, +On some high tower, of midnight sentinel. +But one still watched; no self-encircled woes +Chased from his lids the angel of repose; +He watched, he wept, for thoughts of bitter years +Bowed his dark lashes, wet with burning tears +His country's sufferings and her children's shame +Streamed o'er his memory like a forest's flame; +Each treasured insult, each remembered wrong, +Rolled through his heart and kindled into song. +His taper faded; and the morning gales +Swept through the world the war-song of Marseilles! + +Now, while around the smiles of Peace expand, +And Plenty's wreaths festoon the laughing land; +While France ships outward her reluctant ore, +And half our navy basks upon the shore; +From ruder themes our meek-eyed Muses turn +To crown with roses their enamelled urn. + +If e'er again return those awful days +Whose clouds were crimsoned with the beacon's blaze, +Whose grass was trampled by the soldier's heel, +Whose tides were reddened round the rushing keel, +God grant some lyre may wake a nobler strain +To rend the silence of our tented plain! +When Gallia's flag its triple fold displays, +Her marshalled legions peal the Marseillaise; +When round the German close the war-clouds dim, +Far through their shadows floats his battle-hymn; +When, crowned with joy, the camps' of England ring, +A thousand voices shout, "God save the King!" +When victory follows with our eagle's glance, +Our nation's anthem pipes a country dance! + +Some prouder Muse, when comes the hour at last, +May shake our hillsides with her bugle-blast; +Not ours the task; but since the lyric dress +Relieves the statelier with its sprightliness, +Hear an old song, which some, perchance, have seen +In stale gazette or cobwebbed magazine. +There was an hour when patriots dared profane +The mast that Britain strove to bow in vain; +And one, who listened to the tale of shame, +Whose heart still answered to that sacred name, +Whose eye still followed o'er his country's tides +Thy glorious flag, our brave Old Ironsides +From yon lone attic, on a smiling morn, +Thus mocked the spoilers with his school-boy scorn. + + + + III. + +When florid Peace resumed her golden reign, +And arts revived, and valleys bloomed again, +While War still panted on his-broken blade, +Once more the Muse her heavenly wing essayed. +Rude was the song: some ballad, stern and wild, +Lulled the light slumbers of the soldier's child; +Or young romancer, with his threatening glance +And fearful fables of his bloodless lance, +Scared the soft fancy of the clinging girls, +Whose snowy fingers smoothed his raven curls. +But when long years the stately form had bent, +And faithless Memory her illusions lent, +So vast the outlines of Tradition grew +That History wondered at the shapes she drew, +And veiled at length their too ambitious hues +Beneath the pinions of the Epic Muse. + +Far swept her wing; for stormier days had brought +With darker passions deeper tides of thought. +The camp's harsh tumult and the conflict's glow, +The thrill of triumph and the gasp of woe, +The tender parting and the glad return, +The festal banquet and the funeral urn, +And all the drama which at once uprears +Its spectral shadows through the clash of spears, +From camp and field to echoing verse transferred, +Swelled the proud song that listening nations heard. +Why floats the amaranth in eternal bloom +O'er Ilium's turrets and Achilles' tomb? +Why lingers fancy where the sunbeams smile +On Circe's gardens and Calypso's isle? +Why follows memory to the gate of Troy +Her plumed defender and his trembling boy? +Lo! the blind dreamer, kneeling on the sand +To trace these records with his doubtful hand; +In fabled tones his own emotion flows, +And other lips repeat his silent woes; +In Hector's infant see the babes that shun +Those deathlike eyes, unconscious of the sun, +Or in his hero hear himself implore, +"Give me to see, and Ajax asks no more!" + +Thus live undying through the lapse of time +The solemn legends of the warrior's clime; +Like Egypt's pyramid or Paestum's fane, +They stand the heralds of the voiceless plain. +Yet not like them, for Time, by slow degrees, +Saps the gray stone and wears the embroidered frieze, +And Isis sleeps beneath her subject Nile, +And crumbled Neptune strews his Dorian pile; +But Art's fair fabric, strengthening as it rears +Its laurelled columns through the mist of years, +As the blue arches of the bending skies +Still gird the torrent, following as it flies, +Spreads, with the surges bearing on mankind, +Its starred pavilion o'er the tides of mind! + +In vain the patriot asks some lofty lay +To dress in state our wars of yesterday. +The classic days, those mothers of romance, +That roused a nation for a woman's glance; +The age of mystery, with its hoarded power, +That girt the tyrant in his storied tower, +Have passed and faded like a dream of youth, +And riper eras ask for history's truth. + +On other shores, above their mouldering towns, +In sullen pomp the tall cathedral frowns, +Pride in its aisles and paupers at the door, +Which feeds the beggars whom it fleeced of yore. +Simple and frail, our lowly temples throw +Their slender shadows on the paths below; +Scarce steal the winds, that sweep his woodland tracks, +The larch's perfume from the settler's axe, +Ere, like a vision of the morning air, +His slight--framed steeple marks the house of prayer; +Its planks all reeking and its paint undried, +Its rafters sprouting on the shady side, +It sheds the raindrops from its shingled eaves +Ere its green brothers once have changed their leaves. + +Yet Faith's pure hymn, beneath its shelter rude, +Breathes out as sweetly to the tangled wood +As where the rays through pictured glories pour +On marble shaft and tessellated floor;-- +Heaven asks no surplice round the heart that feels, +And all is holy where devotion kneels. +Thus on the soil the patriot's knee should bend +Which holds the dust once living to defend; +Where'er the hireling shrinks before the free, +Each pass becomes "a new Thermopylae"! +Where'er the battles of the brave are won, +There every mountain "looks on Marathon"! + +Our fathers live; they guard in glory still +The grass-grown bastions of the fortressed hill; +Still ring the echoes of the trampled gorge, +With /God and Freedom. England and Saint George/! +The royal cipher on the captured gun +Mocks the sharp night-dews and the blistering sun; +The red-cross banner shades its captor's bust, +Its folds still loaded with the conflict's dust; +The drum, suspended by its tattered marge, +Once rolled and rattled to the Hessian's charge; +The stars have floated from Britannia's mast, +The redcoat's trumpets blown the rebel's blast. + +Point to the summits where the brave have bled, +Where every village claims its glorious dead; +Say, when their bosoms met the bayonet's shock, +Their only corselet was the rustic frock; +Say, when they mustered to the gathering horn, +The titled chieftain curled his lip in scorn, +Yet, when their leader bade his lines advance, +No musket wavered in the lion's glance; +Say, when they fainted in the forced retreat, +They tracked the snow-drifts with their bleeding feet, +Yet still their banners, tossing in the blast, +Bore Ever Ready, faithful to the last, +Through storm and battle, till they waved again +On Yorktown's hills and Saratoga's plain + +Then, if so fierce the insatiate patriot's flame, +Truth looks too pale and history seems too tame, +Bid him await some new Columbiad's page, +To gild the tablets of an iron age, +And save his tears, which yet may fall upon +Some fabled field, some fancied Washington! + + + + IV. + +But once again, from their AEolian cave, +The winds of Genius wandered on the wave. +Tired of the scenes the timid pencil drew, +Sick of the notes the sounding clarion blew, +Sated with heroes who had worn so long +The shadowy plumage of historic song, +The new-born poet left the beaten course, +To track the passions to their living source. + +Then rose the Drama;--and the world admired +Her varied page with deeper thought inspired +Bound to no clime, for Passion's throb is one +In Greenland's twilight or in India's sun; +Born for no age, for all the thoughts that roll +In the dark vortex of the stormy soul, +Unchained in song, no freezing years can tame; +God gave them birth, and man is still the same. +So full on life her magic mirror shone, +Her sister Arts paid tribute to her throne; +One reared her temple, one her canvas warmed, +And Music thrilled, while Eloquence informed. +The weary rustic left his stinted task +For smiles and tears, the dagger and the mask; +The sage, turned scholar, half forgot his lore, +To be the woman he despised before. +O'er sense and thought she threw her golden chain, +And Time, the anarch, spares her deathless reign. + +Thus lives Medea, in our tamer age, +As when her buskin pressed the Grecian stage; +Not in the cells where frigid learning delves +In Aldine folios mouldering on their shelves, +But breathing, burning in the glittering throng, +Whose thousand bravoes roll untired along, +Circling and spreading through the gilded halls, +From London's galleries to San Carlo's walls! + +Thus shall he live whose more than mortal name +Mocks with its ray the pallid torch of Fame; +So proudly lifted that it seems afar +No earthly Pharos, but a heavenly star, +Who, unconfined to Art's diurnal bound, +Girds her whole zodiac in his flaming round, +And leads the passions, like the orb that guides, +From pole to pole, the palpitating tides! + + + + V. + +Though round the Muse the robe of song is thrown, +Think not the poet lives in verse alone. +Long ere the chisel of the sculptor taught +The lifeless stone to mock the living thought; +Long ere the painter bade the canvas glow +With every line the forms of beauty know; +Long ere the iris of the Muses threw +On every leaf its own celestial hue, +In fable's dress the breath of genius poured, +And warmed the shapes that later times adored. + +Untaught by Science how to forge the keys +That loose the gates of Nature's mysteries; +Unschooled by Faith, who, with her angel tread, +Leads through the labyrinth with a single thread, +His fancy, hovering round her guarded tower, +Rained through its bars like Danae's golden shower. + +He spoke; the sea-nymph answered from her cave +He called; the naiad left her mountain wave +He dreamed of beauty; lo, amidst his dream, +Narcissus, mirrored in the breathless stream; +And night's chaste empress, in her bridal play, +Laughed through the foliage where Endymion lay; +And ocean dimpled, as the languid swell +Kissed the red lip of Cytherea's shell + +Of power,--Bellona swept the crimson field, +And blue-eyed Pallas shook her Gorgon shield; +O'er the hushed waves their mightier monarch drove, +And Ida trembled to the tread of Jove! + +So every grace that plastic language knows +To nameless poets its perfection owes. +The rough-hewn words to simplest thoughts confined +Were cut and polished in their nicer mind; +Caught on their edge, imagination's ray +Splits into rainbows, shooting far away;-- +From sense to soul, from soul to sense, it flies, +And through all nature links analogies; +He who reads right will rarely look upon +A better poet than his lexicon! + +There is a race which cold, ungenial skies +Breed from decay, as fungous growths arise; +Though dying fast, yet springing fast again, +Which still usurps an unsubstantial reign, +With frames too languid for the charms of sense, +And minds worn down with action too intense; +Tired of a world whose joys they never knew, +Themselves deceived, yet thinking all untrue; +Scarce men without, and less than girls within, +Sick of their life before its cares begin;-- +The dull disease, which drains their feeble hearts, +To life's decay some hectic thrill's imparts, +And lends a force which, like the maniac's power, +Pays with blank years the frenzy of an hour. + +And this is Genius! Say, does Heaven degrade +The manly frame, for health, for action made? +Break down the sinews, rack the brow with pains, +Blanch the right cheek and drain the purple veins, +To clothe the mind with more extended sway, +Thus faintly struggling in degenerate clay? + +No! gentle maid, too ready to admire, +Though false its notes, the pale enthusiast's lyre; +If this be genius, though its bitter springs +Glowed like the morn beneath Aurora's wings, +Seek not the source whose sullen bosom feeds +But fruitless flowers and dark, envenomed weeds. + +But, if so bright the dear illusion seems, +Thou wouldst be partner of thy poet's dreams, +And hang in rapture on his bloodless charms, +Or die, like Raphael, in his angel arms, +Go and enjoy thy blessed lot,--to share +In Cowper's gloom or Chatterton's despair! + +Not such were they whom, wandering o'er the waves, +I looked to meet, but only found their graves; +If friendship's smile, the better part of fame, +Should lend my song the only wreath I claim, +Whose voice would greet me with a sweeter tone, +Whose living hand more kindly press my own, +Than theirs,--could Memory, as her silent tread +Prints the pale flowers that blossom o'er the dead, +Those breathless lips, now closed in peace, restore, +Or wake those pulses hushed to beat no more? + +Thou calm, chaste scholar! I can see thee now, +The first young laurels on thy pallid brow, +O'er thy slight figure floating lightly down +In graceful folds the academic gown, +On thy curled lip the classic lines that taught +How nice the mind that sculptured them with thought, +And triumph glistening in the clear blue eye, +Too bright to live,--but oh, too fair to die! + +And thou, dear friend, whom Science still deplores, +And Love still mourns, on ocean-severed shores, +Though the bleak forest twice has bowed with snow +Since thou wast laid its budding leaves below, +Thine image mingles with my closing strain, +As when we wandered by the turbid Seine, +Both blessed with hopes, which revelled, bright and free, +On all we longed or all we dreamed to be; +To thee the amaranth and the cypress fell,-- +And I was spared to breathe this last farewell! + +But lived there one in unremembered days, +Or lives there still, who spurns the poet's bays, +Whose fingers, dewy from Castalia's springs, +Rest on the lyre, yet scorn to touch the strings? +Who shakes the senate with the silver tone +The groves of Pindus might have sighed to own? +Have such e'er been? Remember Canning's name! +Do such still live? Let "Alaric's Dirge" proclaim! + +Immortal Art! where'er the rounded sky +Bends o'er the cradle where thy children lie, +Their home is earth, their herald every tongue +Whose accents echo to the voice that sung. +One leap of Ocean scatters on the sand +The quarried bulwarks of the loosening land; +One thrill of earth dissolves a century's toil +Strewed like the leaves that vanish in the soil; +One hill o'erflows, and cities sink below, +Their marbles splintering in the lava's glow; +But one sweet tone, scarce whispered to the air, +From shore to shore the blasts of ages bear; +One humble name, which oft, perchance, has borne +The tyrant's mockery and the courtier's scorn, +Towers o'er the dust of earth's forgotten graves, +As once, emerging through the waste of waves, +The rocky Titan, round whose shattered spear +Coiled the last whirlpool of the drowning sphere! + + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK POETRY OF O. W. 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