SONNET.
An open wound that has been healed anew;
A stream dried up, that once again is fed
With waters making green its grassy bed;
A tree that withered was, but to the dew
Puts forth young leaves and blossoms fresh of hue,
Even from the branches which had seemed most dead;
A sea which having been disquieted,
Now stretches like a mirror calm and blue,—
Our hearts to each of these were likened well.
But Thou wert the physician and the balm;
Thou, Lord, the fountain, whence anew was filled
Their parchèd channel; Thou the dew that fell
On their dead branches; ’twas thy voice that stilled
The storm within—Thou didst command the calm.
SONNET.
IN A PASS OF BAVARIA BETWEEN THE WALCHEN AND THE WALDENSEE.
“His voice was as the sound of many waters.”
A sound of many waters—now I know
To what was likened the large utterance sent
By Him who ’mid the golden lampads went:
Innumerable streams, above, below,
Some seen, some heard alone, with headlong flow
Come rushing; some with smooth and sheer descent,
Some dashed to foam and whiteness, but all blent
Into one mighty music. As I go,
The tumult of a boundless gladness fills
My bosom, and my spirit leaps and sings:
Sounds and sights are there of the ancient hills,
The eagle’s cry, or when the mountain flings
Mists from its brow, but none of all these things
Like the one voice of multitudinous rills.
SONNET.
What is thy worship but a vain pretence,
Spirit of Beauty, and a servile trade,
A poor and an unworthy traffic made
With the most sacred gifts of soul and sense;
If they who tend thine altars, gathering thence
No strength, no purity, may still remain
Selfish and dark, and from Life’s sordid stain
Find in their ministrations no defence?
Thus many times I ask, when aught of mean
Or sensual has been brought unto mine ear,
Of them whose calling high is to insphere
Eternal Beauty in forms of human art—
Vexed that my soul should ever moved have been
By that which has such feigning at the heart.