Poems, first period | Page 6

arise,
For thousands of years to roll on through the skies;
I saw them in play
Seek their goal far away,--
For a moment my fugitive gaze wandered on,--
I looked round me,
and lo!--all those bright stars had flown!
Madly yearning to reach the dark kingdom of night.
I boldly steer on
with the speed of the light;
All misty and drear
The dim heavens appear,
While embryo systems and seas at their source
Are whirling around
the sun-wanderer's course.
When sudden a pilgrim I see drawing near
Along the lone
path,--"Stay! What seekest thou here?"

"My bark, tempest-tossed,
I sail toward the land where the breeze
blows no more, And Creation's last boundary stands on the shore."
"Stay, thou sailest in vain! 'Tis INFINITY yonder!"-- "'Tis INFINITY,
too, where thou, pilgrim, wouldst wander!
Eagle-thoughts that aspire,
Let your proud pinions tire!
For 'tis here that sweet phantasy, bold to the last,
Her anchor in
hopeless dejection must cast!"
FORTUNE AND WISDOM.
Enraged against a quondam friend,
To Wisdom once proud Fortune
said
"I'll give thee treasures without end,
If thou wilt be my friend
instead."
"My choicest gifts to him I gave,
And ever blest him with my smile;

And yet he ceases not to crave,
And calls me niggard all the
while."
"Come, sister, let us friendship vow!
So take the money, nothing loth;

Why always labor at the plough?
Here is enough I'm sure for
both!"
Sage wisdom laughed,--the prudent elf!--
And wiped her brow, with
moisture hot:
"There runs thy friend to hang himself,--
Be
reconciled--I need thee not!"
ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG MAN. [5]
Mournful groans, as when a tempest lowers,
Echo from the dreary
house of woe;
Death-notes rise from yonder minster's towers!

Bearing out a youth, they slowly go;
Yes! a youth--unripe yet for the
bier,
Gathered in the spring-time of his days,
Thrilling yet with
pulses strong and clear,
With the flame that in his bright eye plays--


Yes, a son--the idol of his mother,
(Oh, her mournful sigh shows
that too well!)
Yes! my bosom-friend,--alas my brother!--
Up! each
man the sad procession swell!
Do ye boast, ye pines, so gray and old,
Storms to brave, with
thunderbolts to sport?
And, ye hills, that ye the heavens uphold?

And, ye heavens, that ye the suns support!
Boasts the graybeard, who
on haughty deeds
As on billows, seeks perfection's height?
Boasts
the hero, whom his prowess leads
Up to future glory's temple bright!

If the gnawing worms the floweret blast,
Who can madly think
he'll ne'er decay?
Who above, below, can hope to last,
If the young
man's life thus fleets away?
Joyously his days of youth so glad
Danced along, in rosy garb beclad,

And the world, the world was then so sweet!
And how kindly, how
enchantingly
Smiled the future,--with what golden eye
Did life's
paradise his moments greet!
While the tear his mother's eye escaped,

Under him the realm of shadows gaped
And the fates his thread
began to sever,--
Earth and Heaven then vanished from his sight.

From the grave-thought shrank he in affright--
Sweet the world is to
the dying ever!
Dumb and deaf 'tis in that narrow place,
Deep the slumbers of the
buried one!
Brother! Ah, in ever-slackening race
All thy hopes their
circuit cease to run!
Sunbeams oft thy native hill still lave,
But their
glow thou never more canst feel;
O'er its flowers the zephyr's pinions
wave,
O'er thine ear its murmur ne'er can steal;
Love will never
tinge thine eye with gold,
Never wilt thou embrace thy blooming
bride,
Not e'en though our tears in torrents rolled--
Death must now
thine eye forever hide!
Yet 'tis well!--for precious is the rest,
In that narrow house the sleep
is calm;
There, with rapture sorrow leaves the breast,--

Man's
afflictions there no longer harm.
Slander now may wildly rave o'er

thee,
And temptation vomit poison fell,
O'er the wrangle on the
Pharisee,
Murderous bigots banish thee to hell!
Rogues beneath
apostle-masks may leer,
And the bastard child of justice play,
As it
were with dice, with mankind here,
And so on, until the judgment
day!
O'er thee fortune still may juggle on,
For her minions blindly look
around,--
Man now totter on his staggering throne,
And in dreary
puddles now be found!
Blest art thou, within thy narrow cell!
To
this stir of tragi-comedy,
To these fortune-waves that madly swell,

To this vain and childish lottery,
To this busy crowd effecting naught,

To this rest with labor teeming o'er,
Brother!--to this heaven with
devils--fraught,
Now thine eyes have closed forevermore.
Fare thee well, oh, thou to memory