LENORE.

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever! Let the bell toll! a saintly soul floats on the Stygian

river;

And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear?-weep now or never more!

See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love Lenore !

Come! let the burial rite be read-the funeral song be sung!

An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young

A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so

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young.

Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,

And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her that she died!

How shall the ritual, then, be read?—the requiem how

be sung

By you by yours, the evil eye,-by yours, the slanderous

tongue,

That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?

Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong! The sweet Lenore hath 'gone before,' with Hope, that flew beside,

Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride

For her, the fair and débonnaire, that now so lowly lies,

The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyesThe life still there, upon her hair-the death upon her

eyes.

"Avaunt! to-night my heart is light. No dirge will I upraise,

But waft the angel on her flight with a Pæan of old days! Let no bell toll! lest her sweet soul, amid its hallowed mirth,

Should catch the note, as it doth float up from the damned earth,

To friends above, from fiends below, the indignant ghost is riven

From hell unto a high estate far up within the HeavenFrom grief and groan, to a golden throne, beside the King of Heaven."

TO HELEN.

I saw thee once-once only-years ago;
I must not say how many-but not many.
It was a July midnight; and from out

A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,
Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,

There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,

With quietude, and sultriness, and slumber,
Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand

Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,

Where no winds dared to stir, unless on tiptoe-
Fell on the upturned faces of those roses
That gave out, in return for the love-light,
Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death-
Fell on the upturned faces of those roses
That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted

By thee and by the poetry of thy presence.
Clad all in white, upon a violet bank

I saw thee half reclining; while the moon
Fell on the upturned faces of the roses,
And on thine own, upturned-alas, in sorrow!

Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight—
Was it not Fate (whose name is also Sorrow),
That bade me pause before that garden-gate,
To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses ?
No foot-step stirred: the hated world all slept,
Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven !—oh, God!
How my heart beats in coupling those two words!)
Save only thee and me. I paused-I looked—
And in an instant all things disappeared.
(Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)
The pearly lustre of the moon went out :
The mossy banks and the meandering paths,
The happy flowers and repining trees,
Were seen no more; the very roses' odors
Died in the arms of the adoring airs.

All-all expired save thee-save less than thou:
Save only the divine light in thine eyes-
Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes.

I saw but them-they were the world to me.
I saw but them-saw only them for hours-
Saw only them until the moon went down.
What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwritten
Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres!

How dark a woe! yet how sublime a hope!

How silently serene a sea of pride!

How daring an ambition! yet how deep

How fathomless a capacity for love!

But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,
Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;
And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees
Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained.
They would not go-they never yet have gone.
Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,
They have not left me (as my hopes have) since.
They follow me they lead me through the years-
They are my ministers-yet I their slave.

Their office is to illumine and enkindle-
My duty, to be saved by their bright light,
And purified by their electric fire,
And sanctified in their elysian fire.

They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope),
And are far up in Heaven-the stars I kneel to
In the sad, silent watches of my night;
While even in the meridian glare of day
I see them still-two sweetly scintillant
Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!

JONES VERY.

It would be a mistake, it is believed, to class Very, as some may have classed him, among minor or obscure poets; for it would be to neglect alike the quality of his inspiration and the tone of his diction. Yet to make this affirmation alone would not be sufficient. We have much reason to think that in greatness as well as in completeness of sincerity, the poems of Very may be taken as those of one of the chief American poets.

Very's outward life, while honorable, was uneventful. Jones Very was born at Salem, Massachusetts, August 28, 1813. In his boyhood he accompanied his father, a shipmaster, on voyages to New Orleans and to Cronstadt. Having entered Harvard in 1834, he was graduated in 1836, and was appointed tutor in Greek, where he was highly esteemed as a teacher. Meantime he studied in the Divinity School. His best literary work was produced at this time. Afterwards, in 1838, he retired to Salem. A volume containing poems and three essays from him appeared in 1839. Throughout his life among those who knew and understood him he commanded the highest respect. After quiet days he died May 8, 1880.