TWO SKETCHES.
I.
The shadow of her face upon the wall
May take your memory to the perfect Greek;
But when you front her, you would call the cheek
Too full, sir, for your models, if withal
That bloom it wears could leave you critical,
And that smile reaching toward the rosy streak:—
For one who smiles so, has no need to speak,
To lead your thoughts along, as steed to stall!
A smile that turns the sunny side o' the heart
On all the world, as if herself did win
By what she lavished on an open mart:—
Let no man call the liberal sweetness, sin,—
While friends may whisper, as they stand apart,
"Methinks there's still some warmer place within."
II.
Her azure eyes, dark lashes hold in fee:
Her fair superfluous ringlets, without check,
Drop after one another down her neck;
As many to each cheek as you might see
Green leaves to a wild rose! This sign, outwardly,
And a like woman-covering seems to deck
Her inner nature! For she will not fleck
World's sunshine with a finger. Sympathy
Must call her in Love's name! and then, I know,
She rises up, and brightens, as she should,
And lights her smile for comfort, and is slow
In nothing of high-hearted fortitude.
To smell this flower, come near it; such can grow
In that sole garden where Christ's brow dropped blood.
MOUNTAINEER AND POET.
The simple goatherd who treads places high,
Beholding there his shadow (it is wist)
Dilated to a giant's on the mist,
Esteems not his own stature larger by
The apparent image; but more patiently
Strikes his staff down beneath his clenching fist—
While the snow-mountains lift their amethyst
And sapphire crowns of splendour, far and nigh,
Into the air around him. Learn from hence
Meek morals, all ye poets that pursue
Your way still onward up to eminence!
Ye are not great, because creation drew
Large revelations round your earliest sense,
Nor bright, because God's glory shines for you.
THE POET.
The poet hath the child's sight in his breast,
And sees all new. What oftenest he has viewed,
He views with the first glory. Fair and good
Pall never on him, at the fairest, best,
But stand before him, holy, and undressed
In week-day false conventions; such as would
Drag other men down from the altitude
Of primal types, too early dispossessed.
Why, God would tire of all his heavens as soon
As thou, O childlike, godlike poet! did'st
Of daily and nightly sights of sun and moon!
And therefore hath He set thee in the midst
Where men may hear thy wonder's ceaseless tune,
And praise His world for ever as thou bidst.