BRIGHT flower, whose home is everywhere!
A Pilgrim bold in Nature's care,
And oft, the long year through, the heir Of joy or sorrow,
Methinks that there abides in thee
Some concord with humanity,
Given to no other Flower I see The forest through!
And wherefore? Man is soon deprest; A thoughtless Thing! who, once unblest, Does little on his memory rest,
But Thou wouldst teach him how to find A shelter under every wind,
A hope for times that are unkind And every season.
Thou wander'st this wide world about, Uncheck'd by pride or scrupulous doubt, With friends to greet thee, or without, Yet pleased and willing;
Meek, yielding to the occasion's call, And all things suffering from all, Thy function apostolical In peace fulfilling.
TO A SKY-LARK.
Up with me! up with me into the clouds! For thy song, Lark, is strong; Up with me, up with me into the clouds! Singing, singing,
With clouds and sky about thee ringing, Lift me, guide me till I find That spot which seems so to thy mind!
I have walked through wildernesses dreary, And to-day my heart is weary;
Had I now the wings of a Faery,
Up to thee would I fly.
There's madness about thee, and joy divine
In that song of thine;
Lift me, guide me high and high To thy banqueting-place in the sky.
Joyous as morning,
Thou art laughing and scorning; Thou hast a nest for thy love and thy rest, And, though little troubled with sloth, Drunken Lark! thou wouldst be loth To be such a Traveller as I. Happy, happy Liver,
With a soul as strong as a mountain River, Pouring out praise to the Almighty Giver, Joy and jollity be with us both!
Alas! my journey, rugged and uneven, Through prickly moors or dusty ways must wind; But hearing thee, or others of thy kind, As full of gladness and as free of heaven, I, with my fate contented, will plod on,
And hope for higher raptures when Life's day is done.
Of Man mature, or Matron sage! Or Old-man toying with his age?
I asked -'t was whispered, The devic: To each and all might well belong: It is the Spirit of Paradise
That prompts such work, a Spirit strong, That gives to all the self-same bent Where life is wise and innocent.
TO A SEXTON.
LET thy wheel-barrow alone - Wherefore, Sexton, piling still In thy Bone-house bone on bone 'Tis already like a hill
In a field of battle made,
Where three thousand skulls are laid;
These died in peace each with the other,Father, Sister, Friend, and Brother.
Mark the spot to which I point! From this platform, eight feet square, Take not even a finger-joint: Andrew's whole fire-side is there. Here, alone, before thine eyes, Simon's sickly daughter lies,
From weakness now, and pain defended, Whom he twenty winters tended.
Look but at the gardener's pride - How he glories, when he sees Roses, Lilies, side by side, Violets in families!
By the heart of Man, his tears, By his hopes and by his fears,
Thou, old Gray-beard! art the Warden Of a far superior garden.
Thus then, each to other dear, Let them all in quiet lie, Andrew there, and Susan here, Neighbours in mortality.
And, should I live through sun and rain Seven widowed years without my Jane, O Sexton, do not then remove her, Let one grave hold the Loved and Lover!
FOR THE WANDERING JEW.
THOUGH the torrents from their fountains Roar down many a craggy steep,
Yet they find among the mountains Resting-places calm and deep.
Clouds that love through air to haster, Ere the storm its fury stills, Helmet-like themselves will fasten On the heads of towering hills.
What, if through the frozen centre Of the Alps the Chamois bound, Yet he has a home to enter In some nook of chosen ground.
If on windy days the Raven Gambol like a dancing skiff, Not the less she loves her haven In the bosom of the cliff.
Though the Sea-horse in the Ocean Own no dear domestic cave,
Yet he slumbers-by the motion Rocked of many a gentle wave.
The fleet Ostrich, till day closes, Vagrant over Desert sands, Brooding on her eggs reposes When chill night that care demands.
Day and night my toils redouble, Never nearer to the goal; Night and day, I feel the trouble Of the Wanderer in my soul.
A very Reptile could presume T. show her taper in the gloom, As if in rivalship with One Who sate a Ruler on his throne
cted in the skies.
"Emited Star!" the Worm replied, *Abate this unbecoming pride, (with a less uneasy lustre shine; The shrink'st as momently thy rays Are mastered by the breathing haze; Wife neither mist, nor thickest cloud Tat shapes in Heaven its murky shroud, Hath power to injure mine.
But not for this do I aspire
To match the spark of local fire,
Tat at my will burns on the dewy lawn, With thy acknowledged glories; - No! Yet, thus upbraided, I may show
Wat favours do attend me here,
ke thyself, I disappear
Eere the purple dawn."
When this in modest guise was said, Ares the welkin seemed to spread
A bolag sound—for aught but sleep unfit! H's quaked-the rivers backward ran— Tat Star, so proud of late, looked wan; And reeled with visionary stir
Is he bine depth, like Lucifer
fst headlong to the pit!
Fre raged, and, when the spangled floor
(ancient ether was no more,
New heavens succeeded, by the dream brought forth:
An all the happy Souls that rode
Transgured through that fresh abode,
Had heretofore, in humble trust,
Sne meekly 'mid their native dust, The Gow-worms of the earth!
knowledge, from an Angel's voice Preding, made the heart rejoice (Him who slept upon the open lea: Wing at morn he murmured not; A till life's journey closed, the spot Was to the Pilgrim's soul endeared,
ere by that dream he had been cheered Bath the shady tree.
FOR CERTAIN POLITICAL PRETENDERS.
Who bet hails the sight with pleasure When the wings of genius rise, Their ability to measure
With great enterprise;
But in man was ne'er such daring As yon Hawk exhibits, pairing His brave spirit with the war in
The stormy skies!
Mark him, how his power he uses, Lays it by, at will resumes! Mark, ere for his haunt he chooses Clouds and utter glooms! There, he wheels in downward mazes; Sunward now his flight he raises, Catches fire, as seems, and blazes With uninjured plumes!"-
Stranger, 't is no act of courage Which aloft thou dost discern; No bold bird gone forth to forage
Mid the tempest stern; But such mockery as the Nations See, when public perturbations Lift men from their native stations, Like yon TUFT OF FERN;
Such it is; the aspiring Creature Soaring on undaunted wing,
(So you fancied) is by nature
A dull helpless Thing,
Dry and withered, light and yellow;- That to be the tempest's fellow! Wait-and you shall see how hollow Its endeavouring!"
In sight of the Spires, All alive with the fires Of the Sun going down to his rest,
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