Oh! thou soft soother of our earthly wo,
Grant, from my heart thy precious streams to flow!
For what is grief, or pain, or cank’ring care,
When ev’ry pang, another seeks to share.
And when our night of sorrow glides away,80
And joy, returning, gilds the opening day;
Ah! what avails it, if no friendly heart
Bears, in that joy, a sympathizing part:—
For, as the laurel, (through the winter’s gloom,
When all her leafy rivals cease to bloom,
And when each drooping tree, by nature bound,
No longer waves its foliage o’er the ground,)
Maintains her verdure unimpair’d, and green,
And shines conspicuous mid the icy scene:
So does true Friendship, in misfortune’s hour,90
When wint’ry storms o’er life’s gay sunshine low’r;—
When false pretenders, base, and servile band,
Chill at the touch of fortune’s alter’d wand;
So does she cheer the solitary scene,
Glows ever-warm, and blossoms ever-green.
IRREGULAR LINES.
Written at Fifteen Years Old.
There’s not a heart, whose inward shrine
Reflects one throb that rouses mine!
That when young Pleasure rises high,
Can give the smile to Friendship dear;
When Sorrow prompts the speaking sigh,
Can waft its answer,—on the tear.
And yet the world can freely share,
In boist’rous mirth, in vulgar care:—
Albeit it marvels, when the soul
Escapes its tinsell’d, vain control,10
To joy, or weep alone.
For, ah! how few, alas! can find
One dear, one sympathizing mind,
In un’son with their own.
I’ve stood in crowds, where all was gay,
Where Pleasure held her roseate sway;
And there, mid hundreds met to show’r
Fresh flowrets o’er the laughing hour;
I’ve stood, and felt that lonely feel,
As keen, as cold, as piercing steel,20
Which whispers,—What to thee, this crowd?
The vulgar great, the reckless proud?—
On whose unvaried, smiling face,
Not one congenial thought you trace.
There, nought but pleasure seems to shine,
Like o’er the snow, the sun of spring,
There ev’ry heart seems glad;—but thine
Is cold, and sear’d, and withering.
Oh, yes! unknowing, and unknown,
Mid circling throngs—thou art alone!30
But why, oh, why! should I complain?
Before me life extends her plain,
Which Hope, and Fancy lend their pow’rs,
To gild with gold, or deck with flow’rs.
What! though mid all the crowds of state,
My wayward heart is desolate;
Yet oft, I’ve felt the spirit’s play,
That wafts from earth the soul away;
When the calm eye, or musing ear,
Gives nought of life, or motion near;40
To gaze upon the heav’ns, so still, so fair,
(Oh, who can feel a grief, while gazing there?)
To mark, when night extends her sable reign,
Th’ unnumber’d worlds of that ethereal plain,
Till snatch’d from earth, the soul appears to spring
To those high realms, on Rapture’s hallow’d wing.
To change the view!—To note the spreading scene,
The mountain’s grandeur, or the valley’s green;
Or mark the murm’ring riv’let’s wavy blue
Catch, from the skies, their own harmonious hue;50
And (as the moonlight o’er the water throws,
The light that, like the virgin, trembling glows,)
To hear, in thought, th’ aërial Sylphids sweep
Their wings of sapphire o’er the beaming deep:
While the old oak-tree, blasted by the storm,
Spreads o’er the waves its venerable form;
And the hoarse breeze, that, whisp’ring, rushes near,
Gives wild, unearthly music to the ear,
Till Fancy shews the Druids’ ancient train,
Strike their bold harps, and slowly sweep the plain.
Or, if the roaring tempest courts the sight;—61
For scene or dread, or gentle, can delight
The lofty soul;—how sweet, on some sear’d rock,
To mark the warring element’s rough shock;
To smile unmov’d, while bursting thunders roll,
And the red flames of lightning flash the pole;
And calm, uninjur’d, mid the blazing storm,
Like some proud tow’r, to rear the godlike form.
Then, while the conflict fierce he joys to scan,
Man well can feel the majesty of man.70
Yet this, when all the spirits beam,
In loveliest, loftiest, holiest mood,
The world’s vain, heartless vot’ries deem,
The cheerless gloom of solitude.
What! is it Solitude to hold
Rich commune with the soul’s high pow’r?
To mark its various buds unfold,
The bloom, the beauty of the flow’r?
What! is it Solitude to trace,
The hand of heav’n in Nature’s face?80
’Tis then the rising breast can throw
Its deathless essence, far from aught
That savours of the world below;
And, with the beings rear’d by thought,
Can oft converse in Fancy’s shrine,
Until it feels an heav’n-born ray,
Around in mystic beamings play,
And mix a something half-divine.
Oh! ’tis not Solitude!—’tis more
Than life—than earth—than all can give;90
’Tis on the wings of heav’n to soar—
’Tis in the land of bliss to live.
STANZAS TO LYRA.
Written at Fifteen Years Old.
The hour for love, in all its bliss,
In all its purity of truth,
Is, when time prints his earliest kiss
Upon the open brow of youth;—
When all the heart is on the sigh,
That love has never heav’d before;
When the soft language of the eye
Tells all the rising bosom’s core.