Thy hands are busy, noisy blast, But what would fill an infant's hand; Yet, ere thou goest, each tree shall stand With trunk unveil'd, and leafless bough. Yet no: the oak and beech shall still It scorns you both, defies your bluster, Unless for Christmas garniture. Like leaves from some deciduous tree, Oh, may I like yon holly be, And gain those nobler tastes, which stay! May I accomplishments possess, To make me, like the holly bower, Retain a cheering leafiness, Yea, e'en in age's wintry hour. R. TO A BUTTERFLY RESTING ON A SKULL. BY F. HEMANS. CREATURE of air and light, To chase the south wind through the sunny sky? With Silence and Decay, Fix'd on the wreck of dull Mortality? The thoughts once chamber'd there Have gather'd up their treasures, and are gone! Will the dust tell us where They that have burst the prison-house are flown? Rise, nurseling of the Day, If thou wouldst trace their way! Earth has no voice to make the secret known! Who seeks the vanish'd bird By the forsaken nest and broken shell? Yet free and joyous midst the woods to dwell! Take the bright wings of morn! Thy hope calls heavenward from yon ruin'd cell! HYMN. Written on a Summer Evening. OH! who, great God, can gaze And thy all-boundless love? Oh! who can see that light Midst thousand stars of night, And yet not feel the sight Can view the lightning glare Confess ONE greater there, + THE ALPS AT DAY-BREAK. BY ROGERS. THE Sunbeams streak the azure skies, The goats wind slow their wonted way, From desert cave, or hanging wood. And while the torrent thunders loud, TO THE EAGLE. BY W. B. CLARKE. BIRD of the storm! whose fiery eye Doth from some cloud-girt peak look down; Oh! that with thee 'twere mine to soar Up to the illimitable sky, Which thou, as foray-field, doth own, Chain'd by mortality, below, Man feels in vain his spirit rise; Encumber'd by his tent of clay, In vain he pants, like thee, to know, The limits of the starry skies, The ceaseless fount of heavenly day. Forth from high eyrie, stretch'd thy wing Thou fadest, in the sunny air, Upon the gazer's prying view. |