Dearest of all, whose tenderness could rise
    To share all sorrow and to soothe all pain;
The blessings breathed for thee with weeping eyes
    Will come to thee as sunshine after rain.

My spirit clings to thine, dear, in this hour;
    Thy sorrow touches me as though 'twere mine;
And pleading prayers for thee shall have the power
    To draw down comfort from my Lord and thine.

For thou hast felt the sorrow and the care
    Of other lives, as though they were thine own;
And grateful prayers, for a memorial are
    Laid up for thee before the great white throne.

You sit bereaved, and I sit with you there
    In sympathy, my soul and yours can meet;
Missing the face that was so very fair,
    Missing the voice that was so very sweet.

I...

Stern, stern is the voice of fate's fearful command,
When accents of horror it breathes in our ear,
Or compels us for aye bid adieu to the land,
Where exists that loved friend to our bosom so dear,

'Tis sterner than death o'er the shuddering wretch bending,
And in skeleton grasp his fell sceptre extending,
Like the heart-stricken deer to that loved covert wending,
Which never again to his eyes may appear -

And ah! he may envy the heart-stricken quarry,
Who bids to the friend of affection farewell,
He may envy the bosom so bleeding and gory,
He may envy the sound of the drear passing knell,

Not so deep is his grief on his death couch reposing,
When on the last vision his dim eyes are closing!
As the outcast whose love-raptured senses are losing,
Th...

"Sister, you've sat there all the day,
Come to the hearth awhile;
The wind so wildly sweeps away,
The clouds so darkly pile.
That open book has lain, unread,
For hours upon your knee;
You've never smiled nor turned your head;
What can you, sister, see?"

"Come hither, Jane, look down the field;
How dense a mist creeps on!
The path, the hedge, are both concealed,
Ev'n the white gate is gone
No landscape through the fog I trace,
No hill with pastures green;
All featureless is Nature's face.
All masked in clouds her mien.

"Scarce is the rustle of a leaf
Heard in our garden now;
The year grows old, its days wax brief,
The tresses leave its brow.
The rain drives fast before the wind,
The sky is blank and grey;
O Jane, what s...

    Such days as break the wild bird's heart;
        Such days as kill it and its songs;
    A death which knows a sweeter part
        Of days to which such death belongs.

    And now old eyes are filled with tears,
        As with the rain the frozen flowers;
    Time moves so slowly one but fears
        The burthen on his wasted powers.

    And so he stopped;--and thou art dead!
        And that is found which once was feared:--
    A farewell to thy gray, gray head,
        A goodnight to thy goodly beard!

Come, let us weep for Begum; he is dead.
Dead; and afar, where Thamis' waters lave
The busy marge, he lies unvisited,
Unsung; above no cypress branches wave,
Nor tributary blossoms fringe his grave;
Only would these poor numbers advertise
His copious charms, and mourn for his demise.

Blithesome was he and beautiful; the Zoo
Hath nought to match with Begum. He was one
Of infinite humour; well indeed he knew
To catch with mobile lips th' impetuous bun
Tossed him-ward by some sire-encouraged son,
Half-fearful, yet of pride fulfilled to note
The dough, swift-homing down th' exultant throat.

Whilom he pensive stood, infoliate
Of comfortable mud, and idly stirred
His tiny caudal, disproportionate
But not ungraceful, while a wanton herd
Of revel...

The splendor of the kindling day,
The splendor of the setting sun,
These move my soul to wend its way,
And have done
With all we grasp and toil amongst and say.

The paling roses of a cloud,
The fading bow that arches space,
These woo my fancy toward my shroud;
Toward the place
Of faces veiled, and heads discrowned and bowed.

The nation of the awful stars,
The wandering star whose blaze is brief,
These make me beat against the bars
Of my grief;
My tedious grief, twin to the life it mars.

O fretted heart tossed to and fro,
So fain to flee, so fain to rest!
All glories that are high or low,
East or west,
Grow dim to thee who art so fain to go.

I mourn with thee and yet rejoice
That thou shouldst sorrow so;
With Angel choirs I join my voice
To bless the sinner's woe.

Though friends and kindred turn away
And laugh thy grief to scorn,
I hear the great Redeemer say
'Blessed are ye that mourn'.

Hold on thy course nor deem it strange
That earthly cords are riven.
Man may lament the wondrous change
But 'There is joy in Heaven'!

Mild is the parting year, and sweet
The odour of the falling spray;
Life passes on more rudely fleet,
And balmless is its closing day.

I wait its close, I court its gloom,
But mourn that never must there fall
Or on my breast or on my tomb
The tear that would have soothed it all.

On page of thine I cannot trace
The cold and heartless commonplace,
A statue's fixed and marble grace.

For ever as these lines I penned,
Still with the thought of thee will blend
That of some loved and common friend,

Who in life's desert track has made
His pilgrim tent with mine, or strayed
Beneath the same remembered shade.

And hence my pen unfettered moves
In freedom which the heart approves,
The negligence which friendship loves.

And wilt thou prize my poor gift less
For simple air and rustic dress,
And sign of haste and carelessness?

Oh, more than specious counterfeit
Of sentiment or studied wit,
A heart like thine should value it.

Yet half I fear my gift will be
Unto thy book, if not to thee,
Of more...

I lay upon the headland-height, and listened
To the incessant sobbing of the sea
    In caverns under me,
And watched the waves, that tossed and fled and glistened,
Until the rolling meadows of amethyst
    Melted away in mist.

Then suddenly, as one from sleep, I started;
For round about me all the sunny capes
    Seemed peopled with the shapes
Of those whom I had known in days departed,
Apparelled in the loveliness which gleams
    On faces seen in dreams.

A moment only, and the light and glory
Faded away, and the disconsolate shore
    Stood lonely as before;
And the wild-roses of the promontory
Around me shuddered in the wind, and shed
    Their petals of pale red.

There was an old belief that in the embers
Of all things the...

"Virtue is but a trifle!" Brutus said
In his defeat; nor was he cozened.
What man did his own goodness e'er advance
Or piety preserve from evil chance?
Some unknown foe confuses men's affairs;
For good and bad alike it nothing cares.
Where blows its breath, no man can flee away;
Both false and righteous it hath power to stay.
Yet still we vaunt us of our mighty mind
In idle arrogance among our kind;
And still we gaze on heaven and think we see
The Lord and his all-holy mystery.
Nay, human eyes are all too dull; light dreams
Amuse and cheat us with what only seems.
Ah, dost thou rob me, Grief, my safeguards spurning,
Of both my darling and my trust in learning?

    I.

    As one in sorrow looks upon
        The dead face of a loyal friend,
    By the dim light of New Year's dawn
        I saw the Old Year end.

    Upon the pallid features lay
        The dear old smile - so warm and bright
    Ere thus its cheer had died away
        In ashes of delight.

    The hands that I had learned to love
        With strength of passion half divine,
    Were folded now, all heedless of
        The emptiness of mine.

    The eyes that once had shed their bright
        Sweet looks like sunshine, now were dull,
    And ever lidded from the light
        That made them beautiful.


    II.

    The chimes of bells were in the air,
        And sounds of mirth in hall and street...

Hope Was but a timid friend;
She sat without the grated den,
Watching how my fate would tend,
Even as selfish-hearted men.

She was cruel in her fear;
Through the bars one dreary day,
I looked out to see her there,
And she turned her face away!

Like a false guard, false watch keeping,
Still, in strife, she whispered peace;
She would sing while I was weeping;
If I listened, she would cease.

False she was, and unrelenting;
When my last joys strewed the ground,
Even Sorrow saw, repenting,
Those sad relics scattered round;

Hope, whose whisper would have given
Balm to all my frenzied pain,
Stretched her wings, and soared to heaven,
Went, and ne'er returned again!

The day is done, the winter sun
Is setting in its sullen sky;
And drear the course that has been run,
And dim the hearts that slowly die.

No star will light my coming night;
No morn of hope for me will shine;
I mourn not heaven would blast my sight,
And I ne'er longed for joys divine.

Through life's hard task I did not ask
Celestial aid, celestial cheer;
I saw my fate without its mask,
And met it too without a tear.

The grief that pressed my aching breast
Was heavier far than earth can be;
And who would dread eternal rest
When labour's hour was agony?

Dark falls the fear of this despair
On spirits born of happiness;
But I was bred the mate of care,
The foster-child of sore distress.

No sighs for me, no sympathy...

Dread Mother of Forgetfulness
Who, when Thy reign begins,
Wipest away the Soul's distress,
And memory of her sins.

The trusty Worm that dieth not
The steadfast Fire also,
By Thy contrivance are forgot
In a completer woe.

Thine are the lidless eyes of night
That stare upon our tears,
Through certain hours which in our sight
Exceed a thousand years:

Thine is the thickness of the Dark
That presses in our pain,
As Thine the Dawn that bids us mark
Life's grinning face again.

Thine is the weariness outworn
No promise shall relieve,
That says at eve, "Would God 'twere morn"
At morn, "Would God 'twere eve!"

And when Thy tender mercies cease
And life unvexed is due,
Instant upon the false release
The Worm...

All are not taken; there are left behind
Living Belovèds, tender looks to bring
And make the daylight still a happy thing,
And tender voices, to make soft the wind:
But if it were not so, if I could find
No love in all this world for comforting,
Nor any path but hollowly did ring
Where 'dust to dust' the love from life disjoin'd;
And if, before those sepulchres unmoving
I stood alone (as some forsaken lamb
Goes bleating up the moors in weary dearth)
Crying 'Where are ye, O my loved and loving?'
I know a voice would sound, 'Daughter, I am.
Can I suffice for Heaven and not for earth?'

Let no tears fall
If then they fell not.
If eyes told nothing,
Now let them tell not.
Once there was time
For words, looks and tears:
That time is past, is past--
Heart, thou shalt tell not!

Beyond any speech
Is silence bitter,
As between love and love
Nothing is sweeter.
Once there was time, time yet
For words, looks and tears ...
Past, past, past, past--
Nothing so bitter!

Now if tears come
That then fell never;
If eyes such sad, sad things
Look now for ever;
If words, looks or tears
Tremble with telling,
Oh, what returning voice is it whispers
Never, never, never!

1.

Parent of golden dreams, Romance!
Auspicious Queen of childish joys,
Who lead'st along, in airy dance,
Thy votive train of girls and boys;
At length, in spells no longer bound,
I break the fetters of my youth;
No more I tread thy mystic round,
But leave thy realms for those of Truth.


2.

And yet 'tis hard to quit the dreams
Which haunt the unsuspicious soul,
Where every nymph a goddess seems,
Whose eyes through rays immortal roll;
While Fancy holds her boundless reign,
And all assume a varied hue;
When Virgins seem no longer vain,
And even Woman's smiles are true.


3.

And must we own thee, but a name,
And from thy hall of clouds descend?
Nor find a Sylph in every dame,
A Pylades [1]<...