As, filled with heaven-ward trust, they say,
"Earth may not claim thee longer;'
Nay, dearest; 'tis too much-this heart
Must break, when thou art gone;
It must not be; we may not part;
I could not live" alone!"
Song of the Stars.-BRYANT.
WHEN the radiant morn of creation broke,
And the world in the smile of God awoke,
And the empty realms of darkness and death
Were moved through their depths by his mighty breath,
And orbs of beauty, and spheres of flame,
From the void abyss, by myriads came,
In the joy of youth, as they darted away,
Through the widening wastes of space to play,
Their silver voices in chorus rung;
And this was the song the bright ones sung:—
"Away, away! through the wide, wide sky,The fair blue fields that before us lie,
with the worlds that round us roll,
Each planet, poised on her turning pole,
With her isles of green, and her clouds of white,
And her waters that lie like fluid light.
"For the Source of glory uncovers his face,
And the brightness o'erflows unbounded space;
And we drink, as we go, the luminous tides
In our ruddy air and our blooming sides.
Lo, yonder the living splendors play :
Away, on our joyous path away!
"Look, look, through our glittering ranks afar,
In the infinite azure, star after star,
How they brighten and bloom as they swiftly pass!
How the verdure runs o'er each rolling mass!
And the path of the gentle winds is seen,
Where the small waves dance, and the young woods lean.
"And see, where the brighter day-beams pour, How the rainbows hang in the sunny shower;
And the morn and the eve, with their pomp of hues,
Shift o'er the bright planets, and shed their dews;
And, twixt them both, o'er the teeming ground,
With her shadowy cone, the night goes round!
"Away, away!—in our blossoming bowers,
In the soft air, wrapping these spheres of ours,
In the seas and fountains that shine with morn,
See, love is brooding, and life is born,
And breathing myriads are breaking from night,
To rejoice, like us, in motion and light.
"Glide on in your beauty, ye youthful spheres,
To weave the dance that measures the years.
Glide on, in the glory and gladness sent
To the farthest wall of the firmament,—
The boundless visible smile of Him,
To the veil of whose brow our lamps are dim."
Summer Evening at a short Distance from the City.ALONZO LEWIS.
AND now the city smoke begins to rise,
And spread its volume o'er the misty sea;
From school dismissed, the barefoot urchin hies
To drive the cattle from the upland lea;
With gentle pace we cross the polished beach,
And the sun sets as we our mansion reach.
Then come the social joys of summer eve,
The pleasant walk along the river-side,
What time their task the weary boatmen leave,
And little fishes from the silver tide,
Elate with joy, leap in successive springs,
And spread the wavelets in diverging rings.
High overhead the stripe-winged nighthawk soars
With loud responses to his distant love;
And while the air for insects he explores,
In frequent swoop descending from above,
Startles, with whizzing sound, the fearful wight,
Who wanders lonely in the silent night.
Around our heads the bat, on leathern wings,
In airy circles wheels his sudden flight;
The whippoorwill, in distant forest, sings
Her loud, unvaried song; and o'er the night
The boding owl, upon the evening gale,
Sends forth her wild and melancholy wail.
The first sweet hour of gentle evening flies,
On downy pinions to eternal rest;
Along the vale the balmy breezes rise,
Fanning the languid boughs; while in the west
The last faint streaks of daylight die away,
And night and silence close the summer day.
Introduction to the Poem of" Yamoyden."-
ROBERT C. SANDS.
Go forth, sad fragments of a broken strain,
The last that either bard shall e'er essay:
The hand can ne'er attempt the chords again,
That first awoke them in a happier day:
Where sweeps the ocean breeze its desert way,
His requiem murmurs o'er the moaning wave;
And he who feebly now prolongs the lay
Shall ne'er the minstrel's hallowed honors crave;
His harp lies buried deep in that untimely grave !
Friend of my youth! with thee began the love
Of sacred song; the wont, in golden dreams,
'Mid classic realms of splendors past to rove,
O'er haunted steep, and by immortal streams;
Where the blue wave, with sparkling bosom gleams
Round shores, the mind's eternal heritage,
For ever lit by memory's twilight beams;
Where the proud dead, that live in storied page,
Beckon, with awful port, to glory's earlier age.
There would we linger oft, entranced, to hear,
O'er battle fields, the epic thunders roll;
Or list, where tragic wail upon the ear,
Through Argive palaces shrill echoing stole ;
There would we mark, uncurbed by all control,
In central heaven, the Theban eagle's flight;
Or hold communion with the musing soul
Of sage or bard, who sought, 'mid pagan night,
In loved Athenian groves, for truth's eternal light.
Homeward we turned to that fair land, but late
Redeemed from the strong spell that bound it fast,
Where Mystery, brooding o'er the waters, sate,
And kept the key, till three millenniums past;
When, as creation's noblest work was last,
Latest, to man it was vouchsafed to see
Nature's great wonder, long by clouds o'ercast,
And veiled in sacred awe, that it might be
An empire and a home, most worthy for the free.
And here forerunners strange and meet were found
Of that blest freedom, only dreamed before ;-
Dark were the morning mists, that lingered round
Their birth and story, as the hue they bore.
"Earth was their mother;" or they knew no more,
Or would not that their secret should be told;
For they were grave and silent; and such lore,
To stranger ears, they loved not to unfold,
The long-transmitted tales their sires were taught of old
Kind Nature's commoners, from her they drew
Their needful wants, and learned not how to hoard;
And him whom strength and wisdom crowned they knew,
But with no servile reverence, as their lord.
And on their mountain summits they adored
One great, good Spirit, in his high abode,
And thence their incense and orisons poured
To his pervading presence, that abroad
They felt through all his works,—their Father, King, and God.
And in the mountain mist, the torrent's spray, The quivering forest, or the glassy flood, Soft falling showers, or hues of orient day, They imaged spirits beautiful and good; But when the tempest roared, with voices rude, Or fierce, red lightning fired the forest pine, Or withering heats untimely seared the wood, The angry forms they saw of powers malign; These they besought to spare, those blessed for aid divine.
As the fresh sense of life, through every vein,
With the pure air they drank, inspiring came,
Comely they grew, patient of toil and pain,
And, as the fleet deer's, agile was their frame:
Of meaner vices scarce they knew the name;
These simple truths went down from sire to son,—
To reverence age,—the sluggish hunter's shame,
And craven warrior's infamy, to shun,-
And still avenge each wrong, to friends or kindred done.
From forest shades they peered, with awful dread, When, uttering flame and thunder from its side, The ocean-monster, with broad wings outspread, Came, ploughing gallantly the virgin tide. Few years have passed, and all their forests' pride From shores and hills has vanished, with the race, Their tenants erst, from memory who have died, Like airy shapes, which eld was wont to trace, In each green thicket's depths, and lone, sequestered place
And many a gloomy tale tradition yet
Saves from oblivion, of their struggles vain,
Their prowess and their wrongs, for rhymer meet
To people scenes where still their names remain;
And so began our young, delighted strain,
That would evoke the plumed chieftains brave,
And bid their martial hosts arise again,
Where Narragansett's tides roll by their grave,
And Haup's romantic steeps are piled above the wave.
Friend of my youth! with thee began my song,
And o'er thy bier its latest accents die;
Misled in phantom-peopled realms too long,—
Though not to me the muse averse deny,
Sometimes, perhaps, her visions to descry,—
Such thriftless pastime should with youth be o'er;
And he who loved with thee his notes to try,
But for thy sake such idlesse would deplore,—
And swears to meditate the thankless muse no more.
But no! the freshness of that past shall still
Sacred to memory's holiest musings be;
When through the ideal fields of song, at will,
He roved, and gathered chaplets wild with thee;
When, reckless of the world, alone and free,
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