If I desire with pleasant songs
To throw a merry hour away, Comes Love unto me, and my wrongs
In careful tale he doth display, And asks me how I stand for singing While I my helpless hands am wringing. And then another time if I
A noon in shady bower would pass, Comes he with stealthy gestures sly
And flinging down upon the grass, Quoth he to me: My master dear, Think of this noontide such a year!
And if elsewhere I lay my head
On pillow with intent to sleep, Lies Love beside me on the bed,
And gives me ancient words to keep; Says he: These looks, these tokens number, May be, they'll help you to a slumber.
So every time when I would yield
An hour to quiet, comes he still; And hunts up every sign conceal'd
And every outward sign of ill; And gives me his sad face's pleasures For merriment's or sleep's or leisure's.
HE sang so wildly, did the Boy, That you could never tell
If 't was a madman's voice you heard, Or if the spirit of a bird
Within his heart did dwell:
A bird that dallies with his voice Among the matted branches; Or on the free blue air his note To pierce, and fall, and rise, and float, With bolder utterance launches. None ever was so sweet as he, The boy that wildly sang to me; Though toilsome was the way and long, He led me not to lose the song.
But when again we stood below The unhidden sky, his feet Grew slacker, and his note more slow, But more than doubly sweet. He led me then a little way Athwart the barren moor,
And then he stayed and bade me stay Beside a cottage door;
I could have stayed of mine own will, In truth, my eye and heart to fill With the sweet sight which I saw there, At the dwelling of the cottager.
A little in the doorway sitting, The mother plied her busy knitting, And her cheek so softly smil'd, You might be sure, although her gaze Was on the meshes of the lace, Yet her thoughts were with her child. But when the boy had heard her voice, As o'er her work she did rejoice, His became silent altogether, And slily creeping by the wall, He seiz'd a single plume, let fall By some wild bird of longest feather; And all a-tremble with his freak, He touch'd her lightly on the cheek.
Oh, what a loveliness her eyes Gather in that one moment's space, While peeping round the post she spies Her darling's laughing face! Oh, mother's love is glorifying, On the cheek like sunset lying; In the eyes a moisten'd light, Softer than the moon at night!
SHE wore a wreath of roses
The night that first we met; Her lovely face was smiling Beneath her curls of jet. Her footstep had the lightness, Her voice the joyous tone, The tokens of a youthful heart, Where sorrow is unknown. I saw her but a moment,
Yet methinks I see her now, With the wreath of summer flowers Upon her snowy brow.
A wreath of orange-blossoms, When next we met, she wore ; The expression of her features
Was more thoughtful than before; And standing by her side was one Who strove, and not in vain,
To soothe her, leaving that dear home She ne'er might view again.
I saw her but a moment,
Yet methinks I see her now,
With the wreath of orange-blossoms Upon her snowy brow.
And once again I see that brow; No bridal-wreath is there, The widow's sombre cap conceals Her once luxuriant hair.
She weeps in silent solitude,
And there is no one near To press her hand within his own, And wipe away the tear.
I see her broken-hearted;
Yet methinks I see her now, In the pride of youth and beauty, With a garland on her brow.
OH! WHERE DO FAIRIES HIDE THEIR HEADS ?
OH! where do fairies hide their heads When snow lies on the hills,
When frost has spoil'd their mossy beds, And crystalliz'd their rills? Beneath the moon they cannot trip In circles o'er the plain;
And draughts of dew they cannot sip Till green leaves come again.
Perhaps, in small, blue diving-bells, They plunge beneath the waves, Inhabiting the wreathed shells That lie in coral caves; Perhaps, in red Vesuvius, Carousals they maintain; And cheer their little spirits thus, Till green leaves come again.
When they return there will be mirth And music in the air, And fairy wings upon the earth, And mischief everywhere. The maids, to keep the elves aloof, Will bar the doors in vain ; No key-hole will be fairy-proof, When green leaves come again.
THE baron hath the landward park, the fisher hath the sea;
But the rocky haunts of the sea-fowl belong alone to me.
The baron hath the landward park, the fisher hath the sea;
But the rocky haunts of the sea-fowl be long alone to me.
WHEN on the breath of autumn breeze, From pastures dry and brown, Goes floating like an idle thought
The fair white thistle-down, Oh then what joy to walk at will Upon the golden harvest hill !
What joy in dreamy ease to lie
Amid a field new shorn, And see all round on sun-lit slopes
The pil'd-up stacks of corn; And send the fancy wandering o'er All pleasant harvest-fields of yore.
I feel the day- I see the field, The quivering of the leaves, And good old Jacob and his house
Binding the yellow sheaves; And at this very hour I seem To be with Joseph in his dream.
I see the fields of Bethlehem And reapers many a one, Bending unto their sickles' stroke, And Boaz looking on; And Ruth, the Moabite so fair, Among the gleaners stooping there.
Again I see a little child,
His mother's sole delight, God's living gift of love unto
The kind good Shunammite; To mortal pangs I see him yield, And the lad bear him from the field.
To sit on the lonely hill;
When the stars are all like dreams,
And the breezes all like sighs,
And there comes a voice from the far-off streams
Like thy spirit's low replies.
Of thee who wert so dear,
And yet I do not weep,
For thine eyes were stain'd by many a tear Before they went to sleep; And, if I haunt the past,
Yet may I not repine
That thou hast won thy rest, at last, And all the grief is mine.
I think upon thy gain,
Whate'er to me it cost,
And fancy dwells with less of pain On all that I have lost,
Hope, like the cuckoo's oft-told tale, Alas, it wears her wing!
And love that, like the nightingale, Sings only in the spring.
Thou art my spirit's all,
Just as thou wert in youth,
Still from thy grave no shadows fall Upon my lonely truth ;
A taper yet above thy tomb,
Since lost its sweeter rays,
And what is memory, through the gloom, Was hope, in brighter days.
I am pining for the home
Where sorrow sinks to sleep,
Where the weary and the weepers come, And they cease to toil and weep.
Why walk about with smiles
That each should be a tear,
Vain as the summer's glowing spoils Flung o'er an early bier?
Oh, like those fairy things,
Those insects of the East,
That have their beauty in their wings, And shroud it while at rest;
That fold their colors of the sky When earthward they alight, And flash their splendors on the eye, Only to take their flight;
I never knew how dear thou wert, Till thou wert borne away! I have it yet about my heart, The beauty of that day! As if the robe thou wert to wear, Beyond the stars, were given That I might learn to know it there, And seek thee out, in heaven!
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