The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell | Page 8

with
the milk of Mirth;
Some influence more gay than ours
Hath ruled
thy nature from its birth,
As if thy natal stars were flowers
That
shook their seeds round thee on earth.
And thou, to lull thine infant rest,
Wast cradled like an Indian child;

All pleasant winds from south and west
With lullabies thine ears
beguiled,
Rocking thee in thine oriole's nest,
Till Nature looked at
thee and smiled.
Thine every fancy seems to borrow
A sunlight from thy childish
years,
Making a golden cloud of sorrow,
A hope-lit rainbow out of
tears,--
Thy heart is certain of to-morrow,
Though 'yond to-day it
never peers.
I would more natures were like thine,
So innocently wild and free,

Whose sad thoughts, even, leap and shine,
Like sunny wavelets in the
sea,
Making us mindless of the brine,
In gazing on the brilliancy.
THE FOUNTAIN
Into the sunshine,
Full of the light,
Leaping and flashing
From
morn till night;
Into the moonlight,
Whiter than snow,
Waving so flower-like

When the winds blow;
Into the starlight
Rushing in spray,
Happy at midnight,
Happy by
day;
Ever in motion,
Blithesome and cheery,
Still climbing heavenward,

Never aweary;

Glad of all weathers,
Still seeming best,
Upward or downward.

Motion thy rest;
Full of a nature
Nothing can tame,
Changed every moment,
Ever
the same;
Ceaseless aspiring,
Ceaseless content,
Darkness or sunshine
Thy
element;
Glorious fountain.
Let my heart be
Fresh, changeful, constant,

Upward, like thee!
ODE
I
In the old days of awe and keen-eyed wonder,
The Poet's song with
blood-warm truth was rife;
He saw the mysteries which circle under

The outward shell and skin of daily life.
Nothing to him were
fleeting time and fashion,
His soul was led by the eternal law;

There was in him no hope of fame, no passion,
But with calm,
godlike eyes he only saw.
He did not sigh o'er heroes dead and buried,

Chief-mourner at the Golden Age's hearse, 10
Nor deem that souls
whom Charon grim had ferried
Alone were fitting themes of epic
verse:
He could believe the promise of to-morrow,
And feel the
wondrous meaning of to-day;
He had a deeper faith in holy sorrow

Than the world's seeming loss could take away.
To know the heart of
all things was his duty,
All things did sing to him to make him wise,

And, with a sorrowful and conquering beauty,
The soul of all
looked grandly from his eyes. 20
He gazed on all within him and
without him,
He watched the flowing of Time's steady tide,
And
shapes of glory floated all about him
And whispered to him, and he
prophesied.
Than all men he more fearless was and freer,
And all
his brethren cried with one accord,--
'Behold the holy man! Behold
the Seer!
Him who hath spoken with the unseen Lord!'

He to his

heart with large embrace had taken
The universal sorrow of mankind,
30
And, from that root, a shelter never shaken,
The tree of wisdom
grew with sturdy rind.
He could interpret well the wondrous voices

Which to the calm and silent spirit come;
He knew that the One Soul
no more rejoices
In the star's anthem than the insect's hum.
He in
his heart was ever meek and humble.
And yet with kingly pomp his
numbers ran,
As he foresaw how all things false should crumble

Before the free, uplifted soul of man; 40
And, when he was made full
to overflowing
With all the loveliness of heaven and earth,
Out
rushed his song, like molten iron glowing,
To show God sitting by
the humblest hearth.
With calmest courage he was ever ready
To
teach that action was the truth of thought,
And, with strong arm and
purpose firm and steady,
An anchor for the drifting world he wrought.

So did he make the meanest man partaker
Of all his brother-gods
unto him gave; 50
All souls did reverence him and name him Maker,

And when he died heaped temples on his grave.
And still his
deathless words of light are swimming
Serene throughout the great
deep infinite
Of human soul, unwaning and undimming,
To cheer
and guide the mariner at night.
II
But now the Poet is an empty rhymer
Who lies with idle elbow on the
grass,
And fits his singing, like a cunning timer,
To all men's prides
and fancies as they pass. 60
Not his the song, which, in its metre holy,

Chimes with the music of the eternal stars,
Humbling the tyrant,
lifting up the lowly,
And sending sun through the soul's prison-bars.

Maker no more,--oh no! unmaker rather,
For he unmakes who doth
not all put forth
The power given freely by our loving Father
To
show the body's dross, the spirit's worth.
Awake! great spirit of the
ages olden!

Shiver the mists that hide thy starry lyre, 70
And let
man's soul be yet again beholden
To thee for wings to soar to her
desire.
Oh, prophesy no more to-morrow's splendor,
Be no more

shamefaced to speak out for Truth,
Lay on her altar all the gushings
tender,
The hope, the fire, the loving faith of youth!
Oh, prophesy
no more the Maker's coming,
Say not his onward footsteps thou canst
hear
In the dim void, like to the awful humming
Of the great wings
of some new-lighted sphere! 80
Oh, prophesy no more, but be the
Poet!
This longing was but granted unto thee
That, when all beauty
thou couldst feel and know it,
That beauty in its highest thou shouldst
be.
O thou who