Hath he not always treasures, always friends,

The good great man? three treasures, LOVE, and LIGHT,

And CALM THOUGHTS, regular as infant's breath:

And three firm friends, more sure than day and night,

HIMSELF, his MAKER, and the ANGEL DEATH!

1802. September 23, 1802.

THE PAINS OF SLEEP

ERE on my bed my limbs I lay,
It hath not been my use to pray
With moving lips or bended knees;
But silently, by slow degrees,
My spirit I to Love compose,

In humble trust mine eyelids close,
With reverential resignation,

No wish conceived, no thought exprest,
Only a sense of supplication;
A sense o'er all my soul imprest
That I am weak, yet not unblest,
Since in me, round me, everywhere
Eternal Strength and Wisdom are.

But yester-night I pray'd aloud
In anguish and in agony,

Up-starting from the fiendish crowd
Of shapes and thoughts that tortured

me:

A lurid light, a trampling throng,
Sense of intolerable wrong,

And whom I scorned, those only strong!
Thirst of revenge, the powerless will
Still baffled, and yet burning still!
Desire with loathing strangely mixed
On wild or hateful objects fixed.
Fantastic passions! maddening brawl!
And shame and terror over all!

Deeds to be hid which were not hid,
Which all confused I could not know
Whether I suffered, or I did :

For all seem'd guilt, remorse or woe,
My own or others still the same
Life-stifling fear, soul-stifling shame!

So two nights passed: the night's dismay

Saddened and stunned the coming day. Sleep, the wide blessing, seemed to me Distemper's worst calmity.

The third night, when my own loud

scream

Had waked me from the fiendish dream. O'ercome with sufferings strange and

wild,

99

The tumult rose and ceased: for Peace is nigh

Where wisdom's voice has found a listening heart.

Amid the howl of more than wintry storms,

The halcyon hears the voice of vernal hours

Already on the wing.

Eve following eve, Dear tranquil time, when the sweet sense of Home

Is sweetest! moments for their own sake hailed

And more desired, more precious, for thy song,

In silence listening, like a devout child,

My soul lay passive, by thy various strain

Driven as in surges now beneath the stars,

With momentary stars of my own birth,

Fair constellated foam, still darting off Into the darkness; now a tranquil

sea,

Outspread and bright, yet swelling to the moon.

And when-0 Friend! my comforter and guide!

Strong in thyself, and powerful to give strength!

Thy long sustained Song finally closed, And thy deep voice had ceased-yet thou thyself

Wert still before my eyes, and round us both

That happy vision of beloved facesScarce conscious, and yet conscious of its close

I sate, my being blended in one thought (Thought was it? or aspiration? or resolve ?)

Absorbed, yet hanging still upon the sound

And when I rose, I found myself in

prayer.

January, 1807. 1817.

VERSE, a breeze mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee-
Both were mine! Life went a-maying
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young!

When I was young?-Ah, woeful When !
Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and
Then!

This breathing house not built with hands,

This body that does me grievous wrong,
O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands,
How lightly then it flashed along :-
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore,
On winding lakes and rivers wide,
That ask no aid of sail or oar,
That fear no spite of wind or tide!
Nought cared this body for wind or
weather

When Youth and I lived in't together.
Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like;
Friendship is a sheltering tree;

O! the joys, that came down shower-like, Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,

This drooping gait, this altered size:
But Spring-tide blossoms on thy lips,
And tears take sunshine from thine eyes!
Life is but thought: so think I will
That Youth and I are house-mates still.
Dew-drops are the gems of morning,
But the tears of mournful eve!
Where no hope is, life 's a warning
That only serves to make us grieve,
When we are old :

That only serves to make us grieve
With oft and tedious taking-leave
Like some poor nigh-related guest,
That may not rudely be dismist;
Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while,
And tells the jest without the smile.

1823-April, 1832. 1828-June, 1832.

WORK WITHOUT HOPE

ALL Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair

The bees are stirring-birds are on the wing

And Winter slumbering in the open air, Wears on his smiling face a dream of Spring!

And I the while, the sole unbusy thing, Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing.

Yet well I ken the banks where ama

ranths blow,

Have traced the fount whence streams of nectar flow.

Bloom, O ye amaranths! bloom for whom ye may,

For me ye bloom not! Glide, rich streams, away!

With lips unbrightened, wreathless brow, I stroll:

And would you learn the spells that drowse my soul?

Work without Hope draws nectar in a

sieve,

And Hope without an object cannot live. February, 1827. 1828.

THE GARDEN OF BOCCACCIO Of late, in one of those most weary hours,

When life seems emptied of all genial powers,

A dreary mood, which he who ne'er has known

May bless his happy lot, I sate alone; And, from the numbing spell to win relief, [grief. Call'd on the Past for thought of glee or

I but half saw that quiet hand of thine
Place on my desk this exquisite design,
Boccaccio's Garden and its faery,
The love, the joyaunce, and the gal-
lantry!

An Idyll, with Boccaccio's spirit warm,
Framed in the silent poesy of form.
Like flocks a-down a newly-bathed steep
Emerging from a mist: or like a stream
Of music soft, that not dispels the sleep,
But casts in happier moulds the
slumberer's dream.

Gazed by an idle eye with silent might The picture stole upon my inward sight.

A tremulous warmth crept gradual o'er my chest,

As though an infant's finger touch'd my breast.

And one by one (I know not whence) were brought

All spirits of power that most had stirr'd my thought

In selfless boyhood, on a new world tost Of wonder, and in its own fancies lost; Or charm'd my youth, that, kindled from

above,

Loved ere it loved, and sought a form for love;

Or lent a lustre to the earnest scan
Of manhood, musing what and whence

is man!

Wild strain of Scalds, that in the sea

worn caves

Rehearsed their war-spell to the winds and waves:

Or fateful hymn of those prophetic maids,

That call'd on Hertha in deep forest

glades;

Or minstrel lay, that cheer'd the baron's

feast;

Or rhyme of city pomp, of monk and priest,

Judge, mayor, and many a guild in long

array,

To high-church pacing on the great saint's day.

And many a verse which to myself I sang,

That woke the tear yet stole away the pang.

Of hopes which in lamenting I renew'd. And last, a matron now, of sober mien, Yet radiant still and with no earthly sheen,

Whom as a faery child my childhood woo'd

Even in my dawn of thought-Philosophy;

Though then unconscious of herself, pardie,

She bore no other name than Poesy: And, like a gift from heaven, in lifeful glee,

That had but newly left a mother's knee, Prattled and play'd with bird and flower,

and stone,