The Iron Gate and Other Poems | Page 3

blazes with sulphureous flames?And torches stolen from Tartarean mines??Edwards, the salamander of divines.?A deep, strong nature, pure and undefiled;?Faith, firm as his who stabbed his sleeping child;?Alas for him who blindly strays apart,?And seeking God has lost his human heart!?Fall where they might, no flying cinders caught?These sober halls where WADSWORTH ruled and?taught.
One footstep more; the fourth receding stride?Leaves the round century on the nearer side.?GOD SAVE KING CHARLES! God knows that pleasant knave?His grace will find it hard enough to save.?Ten years and more, and now the Plague, the Fire,?Talk of all tongues, at last begin to tire;?One fear prevails, all other frights forgot,--?White lips are whispering,--hark! The Popish Plot!?Happy New England, from such troubles free?In health and peace beyond the stormy sea!?No Romish daggers threat her children's throats,?No gibbering nightmare mutters "Titus Oates;"?Philip is slain, the Quaker graves are green,?Not yet the witch has entered on the scene;?Happy our Harvard; pleased her graduates four;?URIAN OAKES the name their parchments bore.
Two centuries past, our hurried feet arrive?At the last footprint of the scanty five;?Take the fifth stride; our wandering eyes explore?A tangled forest on a trackless shore;?Here, where we stand, the savage sorcerer howls,?The wild cat snarls, the stealthy gray wolf prowls,?The slouching bear, perchance the trampling moose?Starts the brown squaw and scares her red pappoose;?At every step the lurking foe is near;?His Demons reign; God has no temple here!
Lift up your eyes! behold these pictured walls;?Look where the flood of western glory falls?Through the great sunflower disk of blazing panes?In ruby, saffron, azure, emerald stains;?With reverent step the marble pavement tread?Where our proud Mother's martyr-roll is read;?See the great halls that cluster, gathering round?This lofty shrine with holiest memories crowned;?See the fair Matron in her summer bower,?Fresh as a rose in bright perennial flower;?Read on her standard, always in the van,?"TRUTH,"--the one word that makes a slave a man;?Think whose the hands that fed her altar-fires,?Then count the debt we owe our scholar-sires!
Brothers, farewell! the fast declining ray?Fades to the twilight of our golden day;?Some lesson yet our wearied brains may learn,?Some leaves, perhaps, in life's thin volume turn.?How few they seem as in our waning age?We count them backwards to the title-page!?Oh let us trust with holy men of old?Not all the story here begun is told;?So the tired spirit, waiting to be freed,?On life's last leaf with tranquil eye shall read?By the pale glimmer of the torch reversed,?Not Finis, but The End of Volume First!
MY AVIARY
Through my north window, in the wintry weather,--?My airy oriel on the river shore,--?I watch the sea-fowl as they flock together?Where late the boatman flashed his dripping oar.
The gull, high floating, like a sloop unladen,?Lets the loose water waft him as it will;?The duck, round-breasted as a rustic maiden,?Paddles and plunges, busy, busy still.
I see the solemn gulls in council sitting?On some broad ice-floe pondering long and late,?While overhead the home-bound ducks are flitting,?And leave the tardy conclave in debate,
Those weighty questions in their breasts revolving?Whose deeper meaning science never learns,?Till at some reverend elder's look dissolving,?The speechless senate silently adjourns.
But when along the waves the shrill north-easter?Shrieks through the laboring coaster's shrouds "Beware!"?The pale bird, kindling like a Christmas feaster?When some wild chorus shakes the vinous air,
Flaps from the leaden wave in fierce rejoicing,?Feels heaven's dumb lightning thrill his torpid nerves,?Now on the blast his whistling plumage poising,?Now wheeling, whirling in fantastic curves.
Such is our gull; a gentleman of leisure,?Less fleshed than feathered; bagged you'll find him such;?His virtue silence; his employment pleasure;?Not bad to look at, and not good for much.
What of our duck? He has some high-bred cousins,--?His Grace the Canvas-back, My Lord the Brant,--?Anas and Anser,--both served up by dozens,?At Boston's Rocher, half-way to Nahant.
As for himself, he seems alert and thriving,--?Grubs up a living somehow--what, who knows??Crabs? mussels? weeds?--Look quick! there 's one just diving! Flop! Splash! his white breast glistens--down he goes!
And while he 's under--just about a minute--?I take advantage of the fact to say?His fishy carcase has no virtue in it?The gunning idiot's worthless hire to pay.
Shrewd is our bird; not easy to outwit him!?Sharp is the outlook of those pin-head eyes;?Still, he is mortal and a shot may hit him,?One cannot always miss him if he tries.
He knows you! "sportsmen" from suburban alleys,?Stretched under seaweed in the treacherous punt;?Knows every lazy, shiftless lout that sallies?Forth to waste powder--as he says, to "hunt."
I watch you with a patient satisfaction,?Well pleased to discount your predestined luck;?The float that figures in your sly transaction?Will carry back a goose, but not a duck.
Look! there's a young one, dreaming not of danger;?Sees a flat log come floating down the stream;?Stares undismayed upon the harmless stranger;?Ah! were all strangers harmless as they seem!
Habet! a leaden shower his breast has shattered;?Vainly he flutters, not again to rise;?His soft white