TO A FRIEND.
Green be the turf above thee,
Friend of my better days!
None knew thee but to love thee,
Nor named thee but to praise.
Tears fell, when thou wert dying,
From eyes unused to weep,
And long, where thou art lying,
Will tears the cold turf steep.
When hearts, whose truth was proven,
Like thine are laid in earth,
There should a wreath be woven
To tell the world their worth.
—Fitz-Greene Halleck.
SEVENTH GRADE
PSALM CXXI.
- I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help.
- My help cometh from the Lord, which made Heaven and earth.
- He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: He that keepeth thee will not slumber.
- Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
- The Lord is thy keeper: The Lord is thy shade on thy right hand.
- The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.
- The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: He shall preserve thy soul.
- The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.
—Bible.
RAIN IN SUMMER.
How beautiful is the rain!
After the dust and heat,
In the broad and fiery street,
In the narrow lane,
How beautiful is the rain!
How it clatters upon the roofs
Like the tramp of hoofs!
How it gushes and struggles out
From the throat of the overflowing spout.
Across the window-pane
It pours and pours,
And swift and wide,
With a muddy tide,
Like a river down the gutter roars
The rain, the welcome rain!
The sick man from his chamber looks
At the twisted brooks;
He can feel the cool
Breath of each little pool;
His fevered brain
Grows calm again,
And he breathes a blessing on the rain!
From the neighboring school
Come the boys
With more than their wonted noise
And commotion;
And down the wet streets
Sail their mimic[28] fleets,
Till the treacherous pool
Engulfs them in its whirling
And turbulent ocean.
In the country on every side,
Where, far and wide,
Like a leopard’s tawny and spotted hide,
Stretches the plain,
To the dry grass and the drier grain
How welcome is the rain!
In the furrowed land
The toilsome and patient oxen stand,
Lifting the yoke-encumbered[29] head,
With their dilated nostrils spread,
They silently inhale
The clover-scented gale,
And the vapors that arise
From the well-watered and smoking soil
For this rest in the furrow after toil,
Their large and lustrous eyes
Seem to thank the Lord,
More than man’s spoken word.
From under the sheltering trees,
The farmer sees
His pastures and his fields of grain,
As they bend their tops
To the numberless beating drops
Of the incessant rain.
He counts it as no sin
That he sees therein
Only his own thrift and gain.
These and far more than these,
The Poet sees!
He can behold
Aquarius[30] old
Walking the fenceless fields of air
And, from each ample fold
Of the clouds about him rolled,
Scattering everywhere
The showery rain,
As the farmer scatters his grain.
He can behold
Things manifold
That have not yet been wholly told,
Have not been wholly sung nor said.
For his thought, which never stops,
Down to the graves of the dead,
Down through chasms and gulfs profound
To the dreary fountain-head
Of lakes and rivers under ground,
And sees them, when the rain is done,
On the bridge of colors seven,
Climbing up once more to heaven,
Opposite the setting sun.
Thus the seer,[31]
With vision clear,
Sees forms appear and disappear,
In the perpetual round of strange
Mysterious change
From birth to death, from death to birth;
From earth to heaven, from heaven to earth,
Till glimpses more sublime
Of things unseen before
Unto his wondering eyes reveal
The universe, as an immeasurable wheel
Turning forevermore
In the rapid and rushing river of time.
—Longfellow.
A PSALM OF LIFE.
Tell me not in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle—
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no future, howe’er pleasant;
Let the dead past bury its dead!
Act, act in the living present,
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time:
Footprints that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
—Longfellow.