Now sign your names, which shall be read By village eyes as yet unborn; Begins the clash and clang that tells The joy to every wandering breeze; The blind wall rocks, and on the trees The dead leaf trembles to the bells. O happy hour! and happier hours O happy hour! behold the bride With him to whom her hand I gave. That has to-day its sunny side. To-day the grave is bright for me, For them the light of life increased Who stay to share the morning feast, Who rest to-night beside the sea. Let all my genial spirits advance To meet and greet a whiter sun; My drooping memory will not shun The foaming grape of eastern France. It circles round, and fancy plays, And hearts are warmed and faces bloom, As drinking health to bride and groom, We wish them store of happy days. Nor count me all to blame if I Conjecture of a stiller guest, Perchance, perchance, among the rest, And, though in silence, wishing joy. But they must go; the time draws on, They rise, but linger, it is late; A shade falls on us like the dark From little cloudlets on the grass, But sweeps away as out we pass To range the woods, to roam the park, Discussing how their courtship grew, And talk of others that are wed, And how she looked, and what he said, And back we come at fall of dew. Again the feast, the speech, the glee, The shade of passing thought, the wealth Of words and wit, the double health, The crowning cup, the three times three, And last the dance; - till I retire: Dumb is that tower which spake so loud, And high in heaven the streaming cloud, And on the downs a rising fire: And rise, oh moon, from yonder down, All night the shining vapor sail And pass the silent-lighted town, The white-faced halls, the glancing rills, And catch at every mountain head, And o'er the friths that branch and spread Their sleeping silver through the hills; And touch with shade the bridal doors, With tender gloom the roof, the wall; And breaking let the splendor fall To spangle all the happy shores By which they rest, and ocean sounds, A soul shall draw from out the vast And, moved through life of lower phase, And act and love, a closer link Of those that, eye to eye, snall look No longer half-akin to brute, For all we thought and loved and did, And hoped, and suffered, is but seed Of what in them is flower and fruit; |