Roseate colours on heaven’s high arch
Are beginning to mix with the blue and the gray,
Sol now commences his wonderful march,
And the forests’ wing’d denizens sing from the spray.
Gaily the rose
Is seen to unclose
Each of her leaves to the brightening ray.
Waves on the lake
Rise, sparkle, and break:
O Venus, O Venus, thy shrine is prepar’d,
Far down in the valley o’erhung by the grove;
Where, all the day, Philomel warbles, unscar’d,
Her silver-ton’d ditty of pleasure and love.
Innocence smiling out-carrols the lark,
And the bosom of guilt becomes tranquil again;
Nightmares and visions, the fiends of the dark,
Have abandon’d the blood and have flown from the brain.
Higher the sun
Up heaven has run,
Beaming so fierce that we feel him with pain;
Man, herb, and flower,
Droop under his power.
O Venus, O Venus, thy shrine is prepar’d,
Far down in the valley o’erhung by the grove
Where, all the day, Philomel warbles, unscar’d,
Her silver-ton’d ditty of pleasure and love.
MADNESS.
What darkens, what darkens?—’t is heaven’s high roof:
What lightens?—’t is Heckla’s flame, shooting aloof:
The proud, the majestic, the rugged old Thor,
The mightiest giant the North ever saw,
Transform’d to a mountain, stands there in the field,
With ice for his corslet, and rock for his shield;
With thunder for voice, and with fire for tongue,
He stands there, so frightful, with vapour o’erhung.
On that other side of the boisterous sea
Black Vulcan, as haughty as ever was he,
Stands, chang’d to a mountain, call’d Etna by name,
Which belches continually oceans of flame.
Much blood have they spilt, and much harm have they done,
For both, when the ancient religions were gone,
Combin’d their wild strength to destroy the new race,
Who were boldly beginning their shrines to deface.
O, Jesus of Nazareth, draw forth the blade
Of vengeance, and speed to thy worshippers’ aid;
Beat down the old gods, cut asunder their mail—
Amen!—brother Christians, why look ye so pale.
THE VIOLET-GATHERER.
FROM THE DANISH OF OEHLENSLÆGER.
Pale the moon her light was shedding
O’er the landscape far and wide;
Calmly bright, all ills undreading,
Emma wander’d by my side.
Night’s sad birds their harsh notes utter’d,
Perching low among the trees;
Emma’s milk-white kirtle flutter’d
Graceful in the rising breeze:
Then, in sweetness more than mortal,
Sang a voice a plaintive air,
As we pass’d the church’s portal,
Lo, a ghostly form stood there!
“Emma, come, thy mother’s calling;
Lone I lie in night and gloom,
Whilst the sun and moon-beams, falling,
Glance upon my marble tomb.”
Emma star’d upon the figure,—
Wish’d to speak, but vainly tried,
Press’d my hand with loving vigour,
Trembled—faulter’d—gasp’d—and died!