Poetry

"What should the fruit of victory be ? What spoil should it command ?— Commerce upon the sweeping sea, And peace upon the land."

"What is the social world thou hast forsaken?— A scene of wrong and sorrow, guilt and guile ; Whence Love a long and last farewell has taken, Where friends can smile, and “murder while they smile.”"

"Within that lonely garden what happy hours went by, While we fancied that around us spread foreign sea and sky. Ah! the dreaming and the distant no longer haunt the mind We leave, in leaving childhood, life’s fairy-land behind."

"Round are the woods of the ancient oak, And pines that scorn at the woodman’s stroke ; And yet the axe is on its way, Those stately trees in the dust to lay."

"They have opened the quarries of lime and stone ; There is nothing that man will leave alone : He buildeth the house—he tilleth the soil ; No place is free from care and toil. …. Wo on our wretched and busy race. That will not leave Nature a resting-place. We roam over earth, we sail o’er the wave, Till there is not a quiet spot but the grave."

"Of Europe's childhood was the feudal age, When the world's sceptre was the sword; and power, Unfit for human weakness, wrong, and rage, Knew not that curb which waits a wiser hour."

"Our moral progress has a glorious scope, Much has the past by thought and labour done; Knowledge and Peace pursue the steps of Hope, Whose noblest victories are yet unwon."

"By the aqueduct, of old, Where the silver river rolled, Long since laid in ruins low— But there still the waters flow. Soon decayeth man's endeavour, Nature's works endure for ever."

"Sadly the captive o'er the flowers is bending, While her soft eye with sudden sorrow fills; They are not those that grew beneath her tending In the green valley of her native hills. …. What are the glittering trifles that surround her— What the rich shawl—and what the golden chain— Would she could break the fetters that have bound her, And see her household and her hills again!"

"Will not your giant columns yet behold The world's old age, enlightened, calm, and free; More glorious than the glories known of old— The spirit's placid rule o'er land and sea. All that the past has taught is not in vain— Wisdom is garnered up from centuries gone: Love, Hope, and Mind prepare a nobler reign Than ye have known—Cedars of Lebanon!"

"His home — our English poet's home — Amid these hills is made ; Here, with the morning, hath he come, There, with the night delayed. On all things is his memory cast, For every place wherein he past, Is with his mind arrayed, That, wandering in a summer hour, Asked wisdom of the leaf and flower."

"Until thy hand unlocked its store, What glorious music slept ! Music that can be hushed no more Was from our knowledge kept."

"The crowded city in its streets, The valley, in its green retreats, Alike thy words retain. What need hast thou of sculptured stone ?— Thy temple, is thy name alone."

"Yet thou art on thy course majestic keeping, Unruffled by the breath Of man's vain life or death, Calm as the heaven upon thy bosom sleeping. Still dost thou keep thy calm and onward motion, Amid the ancient ranks Of forests on thy banks, Till thou hast gained thy home—the mighty ocean."

"Already much for man has been effected; The weak and poor man's cause Is strengthened by the laws, The equal right, born with us all, respected."

"Do you see yon vessel riding, Anchored in our island bay, Like a sleeping sea-bird biding For the morrow’s onward way ? See her white wings folded round her As she rocks upon the deep; Slumber with a spell hath bound her, With a spell of peace and sleep."

"The mother takes her little child— Its face is like her own ; The cradle of her choice is wild— Why is it left alone ? The trampling of the buffalo Is heard among the reeds, And sweeps around the carrion-crow That amid carnage feeds."

"Pause, ere we blame the savage code That such strange horror keeps; Perhaps within her sad abode The mother sits and weeps, And thinks how oft those eyelids smiled, Whose close she may not see, And says, "Oh, would to God, my child, I might have died for thee !""

"Look on the crowded prison-gate— Instructive love and care In early life had saved the fate That waits on many there. Cold, selfish, shunning care and cost, The poor are left unknown ; I say, for every soul thus lost, We answer with our own."

"In the deep silence of the midnight hours, I call upon ye, oh ye viewless powers! Before whose presence mortal daring cowers."

"What of yon stately city, where are shrined The warrior’s and the poet’s wreath combined— All the high honours of the human mind! Her walls are bright with colours, whose fine dyes Embody shapes that seem from yonder skies, And in her scrolls the world’s deep wisdom lies. What of her future?—Through the silvery smoke I see the distant vision I invoke. These glorious walls have bowed to time’s dark yoke. I see a plain of desert sand extend Scattered with ruins, where the wild flowers bend, And the green ivy, like a last sad friend."

"Hence, ye dark Spirits! bear the dream away; To-morrow but repeateth yesterday; First, toil—then, desolation and decay. Life has one vast stern likeness in its gloom, We toil with hopes that must themselves consume— The wide world round us is one mighty tomb."

"I see the bright trout springing, Where the wave is dark yet clear, And a myriad flies are winging, As if to tempt him near. With the lucid waters blending, The willow shade yet floats, From beneath whose quiet bending I used to launch my boats."

"O, Lovely isle ! that, like a child, Art sleeping on the sea, Amid whose hair the wind is wild, And on whose cheek the sun has smiled, As there it loved to be."

"It is his hand—it is his words— Too well I know the scroll, Whose style, whose order, and whose shape Are treasured in my soul."

"A fearful thing, the granted wish— The very shape it takes, By some strange mockery of our hope, Another misery makes."

"Time measures many hours ; for me, He measured long and slow; I thought the night would never end, The day would never go."

"They come from the mountains, in thousands they come— There breatheth no trumpet, there beateth no drum: They march in such silence as suiteth the dead, Their herald the thunder that echoes their tread. The sun is midway in his morning advance, His beams kindle musket, and sabre, and lance; While beneath each white turban flows down the long hair; For the locks of the Druse are, like northern locks, fair."

"The falling of fountains—the slight summer rain— The voice of the dove, were less sweet than thy strain; Till stirred with delight, would her exquisite wings Beat time on the west wind, to echo thy strings."

"So like they are—as roses grow Self-same upon the self-same bough, While just some slight shades intervene, To mark a change more felt than seen— As like they are—as nature loth To make a difference, modelled both To the same shape—it was so fair That not a grace was left to spare."

"It is the past that maketh the ideal, Kindling the future with its onward ray, And o’er a world that else would be too real, Flinging the glory of the moral day."

"On the wind a murmur, Seems to float along, Soft as is the music Of remembered song. Bringing at the moment All that dwelt apart In the lone recesses Of the haunted heart. So upon her twilight wings Memory beareth graceful things, From the tales Arabian, From the old Arabian Nights."

"A thousand nameless years went by, As silent as their birth; The clouds that wandered o’er the sky Beheld no change on earth: With one unbroken chronicle, A thousand years left nought to tell."

"But here no tumult ever past, The wild wind brought no sound, Saving the mighty music cast By the dark pine-trees round; And Nature had one hour’s repose Amid the silence of the snows."

"During a considerable part of the year, the Choor is hoary with snow; and when moonlight falls upon the scene, an effect is produced as if floods of molten silver were poured over the surface. Moonlight in these regions assumes a novel charm. The rugged peaks, stern and chilling as they are, lose their awful character, and become brilliant as polished pearl; the trees, covered with icicles, seem formed of some rich spar; and the face of nature becoming wholly changed, presents the features of a world calm and tranquil, but still and deathlike. (Letitia Landon may have her friend Emma Roberts to thank for details of this description)"

"’Tis strange how often early years Will unexpected rise, And bring back soft and childlike tears To cold and world-worn eyes. Soft voices come upon the wind, Old songs and early prayers, And feel how much of good and kind Our weary life still spares."

"The day is yet rosy with wakening from sleep, The stars have one moment gone down in the deep, The flowers have not opened that hide in the grass, And the hares leave their print in the dew as they pass."

"Hope’s fairy arches cross human life’s dark river; Frail the support—while over it there hastens All the sweet beliefs that make the morning fair."

"Oh ! there are moments when the full heart, turning From this life, insufficient, vexed, and drear, Looks to the skies with an impatient yearning, And asks the morning for another sphere."

"Methinks a pleasant lesson Is given by the scene— That age alike and childhood Delight in what has been. They will make, those happy children, The old man’s heart their own— There never was a pleasure Could be enjoyed alone."

"What makes the poet? — Nothing but to feel More keenly than the common sense of feeling; To have the soul attuned to the appeal Of the dim music through all nature stealing."

"Life is a fable, with its lesson last ; Genius, too, has its fable and its moral: Of all the trees that down their shadows cast, Choose you a wreath from any but the laurel."

"Thy angel-nature was not made For struggle or for care; Thou wert too gentle and too good For Heaven long to spare. Thou wert but sent a little while To soothe and to sustain; The angels missed thee from their band And asked for thee again: But not till thou hadst given birth To many a holy thought on earth."

"Years have grown into centuries grey, The king and his people, where are they? Where are the temples of carved stone? Look in the dust—to dust they are gone. Five or six pillars alone remain Of the thousands that crowded that marble plain. The palm-tree that stood by that building of yore Standeth as green as it did before. But the dust is heaped o’er the works of men— And so it hath been, and will be again."

"There is a lovely English sound Upon the English air, It comes when else had silence found Its quiet empire there."

"How still it is ! the bee — the bird — Float by on noiseless wing. There sounds no step — there comes no word, There seems no living thing. But still upon the soft west wind These bells come sweeping by, Leaving familiar thoughts behind, Familiar, and yet high."

"Men gathered fast upon the sands With eager aid—in vain— What is might of human hands To struggle with the main?"

"Hamooda holds a feast to-night — Fill ye the lamps with fragrant light ; Burn, in the twilight's dewy time, The mastic, rosemary, and thyme; And scatter round the festal chamber Oils from the rose, the musk, the amber."

"It is a fearful thing to live, yet be That which is scarcely life — the spirit fled — Death at the heart — our nobler self is dead — The reasoning and responsible, while we Live, like the birds around, unconsciously. God ! in thy mercy keep us from such doom, Let not our mind precede us to our tomb !"

"Too much this weary world of ours Has fallen since the fall ; And low desires, and care, and crime. Hold empire over all. Yet not the less it is our part To do the best we can : A better faith — a better fate Man yet may work for man."