Poems: Collected and Arranged by the Author, Complete in One Volume

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A. Hart, 1852 - 378 pages
 

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Page 131 - Father, thy hand Hath reared these venerable columns, thou Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun, Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze, And shot toward heaven. The century-living crow Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died Among their branches, till, at last, they stood, As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark, Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold Communion with...
Page 41 - TO A WATERFOWL. WHITHER, midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day; Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way ? Vainly the fowler's eye Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darkly seen against the crimson sky, Thy figure floats along.
Page 32 - Earth and her waters, and the depths of air, — Comes a still voice — Yet a few days, and thee The all-beholding sun shall see no more In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground, Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears, Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist . Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again...
Page 35 - So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, that moves To that mysterious realm, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
Page 32 - Of the stern agony and shroud and pall And breathless darkness and the narrow house Make thee to shudder and grow sick at heart, Go forth under the open sky and list To Nature's teachings, while from all around — Earth and her waters and the depths of air — Comes a still voice...
Page 32 - To him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language ; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty ; and she glides Into his darker musings with a mild And gentle sympathy that steals away Their sharpness ere he is aware.
Page 214 - The aged year is near his end. Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye, Look through its fringes to the sky, Blue — blue — as if that sky let fall A flower from its cerulean wall.
Page 132 - ... breath That from the inmost darkness of the place Comes, scarcely felt ; the barky trunks, the ground, The fresh moist ground, are all instinct with thee. Here is continual worship; — nature, here, In the tranquillity that thou dost love, Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around, From perch to perch, the solitary bird Passes ; and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs, Wells softly forth and visits the strong roots Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale Of all the good it does.
Page 134 - God ! when thou Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill With all the waters of the firmament The swift dark whirlwind that uproots...
Page 219 - Of these fair solitudes once stir with life And burn with passion? Let the mighty mounds That overlook the rivers, or that rise In the dim forest crowded with old oaks, Answer. A race, that long has passed away, Built them; — a disciplined and populous race Heaped, with long toil, the earth, while yet the Greek Was hewing the Pentelicus to forms Of symmetry, and rearing on its rock The glittering Parthenon.

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