The Poems, vol 2 | Page 5

Emma Lazarus herself has styled him; and already in this early volume
of hers we have trace of the kinship and affinity that afterwards so
plainly declared itself. Foremost among the translations are a number
of his songs, rendered with a finesse and a literalness that are rarely
combined. Four years later, at the age of twenty-one, she published her
second volume, "Admetus and Other Poems," which at once took rank

as literature both in America and England, and challenged comparison
with the work of established writers. Of classic themes we have
"Admetus" and "Orpheus," and of romantic the legend of Tannhauser
and of the saintly Lohengrin. All are treated with an artistic finish that
shows perfect mastery of her craft, without detracting from the
freshness and flow of her inspiration. While sounding no absolutely
new note in the world, she yet makes us aware of a talent of unusual
distinction, and a highly endowed nature,--a sort of tact of sentiment
and expression, an instinct of the true and beautiful, and that quick
intuition which is like second-sight in its sensitiveness to apprehend
and respond to external stimulus. But it is not the purely imaginative
poems in this volume that most deeply interest us. We come upon
experience of life in these pages; not in the ordinary sense, however, of
outward activity and movement, but in the hidden undercurrent of
being. "The epochs of our life are not in the visible facts, but in the
silent thoughts by the wayside as we walk." This is the motto, drawn
from Emerson, which she chooses for her poem of "Epochs," which
marks a pivotal moment in her life. Difficult to analyze, difficult above
all to convey, if we would not encroach upon the domain of private and
personal experience, is the drift of this poem, or rather cycle of poems,
that ring throughout with a deeper accent and a more direct appeal than
has yet made itself felt. It is the drama of the human soul,--"the mystic
winged and flickering butterfly," "flitting between earth and sky," in its
passage from birth to death.
A golden morning of June! "Sweet empty sky without a stain." Sunlight
and mist and "ripple of rain-fed rills." "A murmur and a singing
manifold."
"What simple things be these the soul to
raise
To bounding joy, and make young pulses
beat
With nameless pleasure, finding life so
sweet!"
Such is youth, a June day, fair and fresh and tender with dreams and
longing and vague desire. The morn lingers and passes, but the noon
has not reached its height before the clouds begin to rise, the sunshine

dies, the air grows thick and heavy, the lightnings flash, the thunder
breaks among the hills, rolls and gathers and grows, until
Behold, yon bolt struck home,
And over ruined fields the storm hath
come."
Now we have the phases of the soul,--the shock and surprise of grief in
the face of the world made desolate. Loneliness and despair for a space,
and then, like stars in the night, the new births of the spirit, the
wonderful outcoming from sorrow: the mild light of patience at first;
hope and faith kindled afresh in the very jaws of evil; the new meaning
and worth of life beyond sorrow, beyond joy; and finally duty, the
holiest word of all, that leads at last to victory and peace. The poem
rounds and completes itself with the close of "the long, rich day," and
the release of
"The mystic winged and flickering butterfly,
A human soul, that drifts at liberty,
Ah! who can tell to what strange paradise,
To what undreamed-of fields and lofty
skies!"
We have dwelt at some length upon this poem, which seems to us, in a
certain sense, subjective and biographical; but upon closer analysis
there is still another conclusion to arrive at. In "Epochs" we have,
doubtless, the impress of a calamity brought very near to the writer, and
profoundly working upon her sensibilities; not however by direct, but
reflex action, as it were, and