MAY EVENING.
The breath of Spring-time at this twilight hour
Comes through the gathering glooms,
And bears the stolen sweets of many a flower
Into my silent rooms.
Where hast thou wandered, gentle gale, to find
The perfumes thou dost bring?
By brooks, that through the wakening meadows wind,
Or brink of rushy spring?
Or woodside, where, in little companies,
The early wild-flowers rise,
Or sheltered lawn, where, mid encircling trees,
May's warmest sunshine lies?
Now sleeps the humming-bird, that, in the sun,
Wandered from bloom to bloom;
Now, too, the weary bee, his day's work done,
Rests in his waxen room.
Now every hovering insect to his place
Beneath the leaves hath flown;
And, through the long night hours, the flowery race
Are left to thee alone.
O'er the pale blossoms of the sassafras
And o'er the spice-bush spray,
Among the opening buds, thy breathings pass,
And come embalmed away.
Yet there is sadness in thy soft caress,
Wind of the blooming year!
The gentle presence, that was wont to bless
Thy coming, is not here.
Go, then; and yet I bid thee not repair,
Thy gathered sweets to shed,
Where pine and willow, in the evening air,
Sigh o'er the buried dead.
Pass on to homes where cheerful voices sound,
And cheerful looks are cast,
And where thou wakest, in thine airy round,
No sorrow of the past.
Refresh the languid student pausing o'er
The learned page apart,
And he shall turn to con his task once more
With an encouraged heart.
Bear thou a promise, from the fragrant sward,
To him who tills the land,
Of springing harvests that shall yet reward
The labors of his hand.
And whisper, everywhere, that Earth renews
Her beautiful array,
Amid the darkness and the gathering dews,
For the return of day.
OCTOBER, 1866.
'Twas when the earth in summer glory lay,
We bore thee to thy grave; a sudden cloud
Had shed its shower and passed, and every spray
And tender herb with pearly moisture bowed.
How laughed the fields, and how, before our door,
Danced the bright waters!—from his perch on high
The hang-bird sang his ditty o'er and o'er,
And the song-sparrow from the shrubberies nigh.
Yet was the home where thou wert lying dead
Mournfully still, save when, at times, was heard,
From room to room, some softly-moving tread,
Or murmur of some softly-uttered word.
Feared they to break thy slumber? As we threw
A look on that bright bay and glorious shore,
Our hearts were wrung with anguish, for we knew
Those sleeping eyes would look on them no more.
Autumn is here; we cull his lingering flowers
And bring them to the spot where thou art laid;
The late-born offspring of his balmier hours,
Spared by the frost, upon thy grave to fade.
The sweet calm sunshine of October, now
Warms the low spot; upon its grassy mould
The purple oak-leaf falls; the birchen bough
Drops its bright spoil like arrow-heads of gold.
And gorgeous as the morn, a tall array
Of woodland shelters the smooth fields around;
And guarded by its headlands, far away
Sail-spotted, blue and lake-like, sleeps the sound.
I gaze in sadness; it delights me not
To look on beauty which thou canst not see;
And, wert thou by my side, the dreariest spot
Were, oh, how far more beautiful to me!
In what fair region dost thou now abide?
Hath God, in the transparent deeps of space,
Through which the planets in their journey glide,
Prepared, for souls like thine, a dwelling-place?
Fields of unwithering bloom, to mortal eye
Invisible, though mortal eye were near,
Musical groves, and bright streams murmuring by,
Heard only by the spiritual ear?
Nay, let us deem that thou dost not withdraw
From the dear places where thy lot was cast,
And where thy heart, in love's most holy law,
Was schooled by all the memories of the past.
Here on this earth, where once, among mankind,
Walked God's belovèd Son, thine eyes may see
Beauty to which our dimmer sense is blind
And glory that may make it heaven to thee.
May we not think that near us thou dost stand
With loving ministrations, for we know
Thy heart was never happy when thy hand
Was forced its tasks of mercy to forego!
Mayst thou not prompt, with every coming day,
The generous aim and act, and gently win
Our restless, wandering thoughts to turn away
From every treacherous path that ends in sin!
THE ORDER OF NATURE.
FROM BOETHIUS DE CONSOLATIONE.
Thou who wouldst read, with an undarkened eye,
The laws by which the Thunderer bears sway,
Look at the stars that keep, in yonder sky,
Unbroken peace from Nature's earliest day.
The great sun, as he guides his fiery car,
Strikes not the cold moon in his rapid sweep;
The Bear, that sees star setting after star
In the blue brine, descends not to the deep.
The star of eve still leads the hour of dews;
Duly the day-star ushers in the light;
With kindly alternations Love renews
The eternal courses bringing day and night.
Love drives away the brawler War, and keeps
The realm and host of stars beyond his reach;
In one long calm the general concord steeps
The elements, and tempers each to each.
The moist gives place benignly to the dry;
Heat ratifies a faithful league with cold;
The nimble flame springs upward to the sky;
Down sinks by its own weight the sluggish mould.
Still sweet with blossoms is the year's fresh prime;
Her harvests still the ripening Summer yields;
Fruit-laden Autumn follows in his time,
And rainy Winter waters still the fields.
The elemental harmony brings forth
And rears all life, and, when life's term is o'er,
It sweeps the breathing myriads from the earth,
And whelms and hides them to be seen no more:
While the Great Founder, he who gave these laws,
Holds the firm reins and sits amid his skies
Monarch and Master, Origin and Cause,
And Arbiter supremely just and wise.
He guides the force he gave; his hand restrains
And curbs it to the circle it must trace:
Else the fair fabric which his power sustains
Would fall to fragments in the void of space.
Love binds the parts together, gladly still
They court the kind restraint nor would be free;
Unless Love held them subject to the Will
That gave them being, they would cease to be.