One, who strove darkly sorrow's sob to stay, And prayed to end my pilgrimage of pain, Oh! had he lived to reach this wretched land, I cannot come with broken heart to sigh O'er his loved dust, and strew with flowers his turf I may not pour the soul-drop from mine eye Near his cold bed: he slumbers in the wave! Oh! I will love the sea, because it is his grave! Anon. ON FRIENDSHIP. The soft blooms of summer are fair to the eye, But dearer to me is the pale lonely rose, Whose blossoms in winter's dark season unclose, And thus when around us affliction's dark power The crowds whom we smiled with, when gladness was ours, Anon. SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS. Sun of the sleepless! melancholy star! That showest the darkness thou canst not dispel, So gleams the past, the light of other days, Which shines, but warms not with its powerless rays; A night-beam sorrow watcheth to behold, Distinct, but distant; clear, but, oh, how cold! TO A NIGHTINGALE. The woodman lifts towards thee his thoughtful eye, And village girls their evening walks prolong, Thou fairy amorist! in the forest singing, Byron. Varied in accents, tremulously flinging I Descends upon me, even as a dream; pause enchanted, and would fain prolong. Each magic note of thy impassioned theme. Its spreading roots 'neath mossy herbage sunk? Where, like the queen of beauty, thou dost shade Thy gentle self in this voluptuous hour, As in a veil of innocence arrayed?— The feathered choir to rest their wings have made With every pause an answer so divine, They emulate, sweet bird! that gentle song of thine.— Children of air! prolong the flowery tale,— Fill every bough, touch every living leaf, Let soft persuasive melody prevail, That every heart, forgetful of its grief, Like mine, exulting for an hour may be, Alastor. THE VASSAL'S LAMENT FOR THE FALLEN TREE. "Here, (at Brereton, in Cheshire,) is one thing incredibly strange, but attested, as I myself have heard, by many persons, and commonly believed. Before any heir of this family dies, there are seen, in a lake adjoining, the bodies of trees swimming on the water for several days." CAMDEN'S BRITANNIA. Yes! I have seen the ancient oak On the dark deep water cast, And it was not felled by the woodman's stroke, Or the rush of the sweeping blast; For the axe might never touch that tree, I saw it fall, as falls a chief By an arrow in the fight; And the old woods shook, to their loftiest leaf, At the crashing of its might! |