The maid that kept her mother's kine, The song that sang she!
She sang her song, she kept her kine, She sat beneath the thorn When Andrew Keith of Ravelston Rode through the Monday morn;
His henchmen sing, his hawk-bells ring, His belted jewels shine!
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
Year after year, where Andrew came,
Comes evening down the glade, And still there sits a moonshine ghost Where sat the sunshine maid.
Her misty hair is faint and fair, She keeps the shadowy kine; O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
I lay my hand upon the stile, The stile is lone and cold, The burnie that goes babbling by Says naught that can be told.
Yet, stranger! here, from year to year, She keeps her shadowy kine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
Step out three steps, where Andrew stood: Why blanch thy cheeks for fear? The ancient stile is not alone,
'Tis not the burn I hear!
She makes her immemorial moan,
She keeps her shadowy kine;
O Keith of Ravelston,
The sorrows of thy line!
COMES Something down with eventide, Beside the sunset's golden bars, Beside the floating scents, beside The twinkling shadows of the stars.
Upon the river's rippling face, Flash after flash the white
He looks, and lo! our altars fall, The shrine reveals its gilded clay, With decent hands we spread the pall, And, cold with wisdom, glide away.
O, where were courage, faith, and truth, If man went wandering all his day In golden clouds of love and youth,
Nor knew that both his steps betray?
Come, Time, while here we sit and wait, Be faithful, spoiler, to thy trust! No death can further desolate
The soul that knows its god was dust.
YE say they all have passed away, That noble race and brave; That their light canoes have vanished From off the crested wave; That mid the forests where they roamed There rings no hunter's shout; But their name is on your waters, Ye may not wash it out.
"T is where Ontario's billow Like ocean's surge is curled, Where strong Niagara's thunders wake The echo of the world. Where red Missouri bringeth
Rich tribute from the West, And Rappahannock sweetly sleeps, On green Virginia's breast.
Ye say their cone-like cabins,
That clustered o'er the vale, Have fled away like withered leaves Before the autumn gale;
But their memory liveth on your hills, Their baptism on your shore, Your everlasting rivers speak Their dialect of yore.
Old Massachusetts wears it Upon her lordly crown,
And broad Ohio bears it
Amid his young renown; Connecticut hath wreathed it
Where her quiet foliage waves; And bold Kentucky breathed it hoarse Through all her ancient caves.
Wachusett hides its lingering voice Within his rocky heart, And Alleghany graves its tone Throughout his lofty chart; Monadnock on his forehead hoar Doth seal the sacred trust;
Your mountains build their monument, Though ye destroy their dust.
Ye call these red-browed brethren The insects of an hour,
Crushed like the noteless worm amid The regions of their power;
Ye drive them from their fathers' lands, Ye break of faith the seal,
But can ye from the court of Heaven Exclude their last appeal?
Ye see their unresisting tribes, With toilsome step and slow, On through the trackless desert pass, A caravan of woe;
Think ye the Eternal Ear is deaf? His sleepless vision dim? Think ye the soul's blood may not cry From that far land to him?
ETERNAL LIGHT.
SLOWLY, by God's hand unfurled, Down around the weary world, Falls the darkness; O, how still Is the working of his will!
Mighty Spirit, ever nigh, Work in me as silently;
Veil the day's distracting sights, Show me heaven's eternal lights.
Living stars to view be brought In the boundless realms of thought; High and infinite desires, Flaming like those upper fires.
Holy Truth, Eternal Right, Let them break upon my sight; Let them shine serene and still, And with light my being fill.
THE grass hung wet on Rydal banks, The golden day with pearls adorning, When side by side with him we walked To meet midway the summer morning.
The west-wind took a softer breath,
The sun himself seemed brighter shining,
(From "THE MASQUE OF THE GODS.")
HOWE'ER the wheels of Time go round, We cannot wholly be discrowned. We bind, in form, and hue, and height, The Finite to the Infinite, And, lifted on our shoulders bare, The races breathe an ampler air. The arms that clasped, the lips that kissed, Have vanished from the morning mist; The dainty shapes that flashed and passed In spray the plunging torrent cast, Or danced through woven gleam and shade,
The vapors and the sunbeams braid, Grow thin and pale: each holy haunt Of gods or spirits ministrant Hath something lost of ancient awe; Yet from the stooping heavens we draw A beauty, mystery, and might, Time cannot change nor worship slight. The gold of dawn and sunset sheds Unearthly glory on our heads; The secret of the skies we keep; And whispers, round each lonely steep, Allure and promise, yet withhold, What bard and prophet never told. While Man's slow ages come and go, Our dateless chronicles of snow Their changeless old inscription show, And men therein forever see The unread speech of Deity.
A SILVER javelin which the hills Have hurled upon the plain below, The fleetest of the Pharpar's rills, Beneath me shoots in flashing flow.
I hear the never-ending laugh
Of jostling waves that come and go, And suck the bubbling pipe, and quaff The sherbet cooled in mountain snow.
The flecks of sunshine gleam like stars Beneath the canopy of shade; And in the distant, dim bazaars, I scarcely hear the hum of trade.
« ForrigeFortsett » |