AT FIRST. TO CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN. My crippled sense fares bow'd along And wronged by death pays life with wrong And the Morning seems but fatigued Night And the healthy mark 'twixt dark and light In sickly sameness out doth fail. And the woods stare strange, and the wind is dumb, -O Wind, pray talk again— And the Hand of the Frost spreads stark and numb As Death's on the deadened window-pane. Still dumb, thou Wind, old voluble friend? Oh vain the up-straining of the hands In the chamber late at night, Oh vain the complainings, the hot demands, No word from over the starry line, No motion felt in the dark, And never a day gives ever a sign Or a dream sets seal with palpable mark. And O my God, how slight it were, How nothing, thou All! to thee, That a kiss or a whisper might fall from her Or some least grace of the body of love, Mere sense of unseen smiling above, Mere dim receipt of sad delight From Nearness warm in the air, BALTIMORE, 1876. INTO the woods my Master went, Into the woods my Master came, But the olives were not blind to Him, The little gray leaves were kind to Him: Out of the woods my Master went, And He was well content. Out of the woods my Master came, Content with death and shame. When Death and Shame would woo Him last, From under the trees they drew Him last : 'Twas on a tree they slew Him-last When out of the woods He came. BALTIMORE, November, 1880. A FLOIRDA SUNDAY. FROM cold Norse caves or buccaneer Southern seas Bewailing old-time wrecks and robberies, They shrive to priestly pines with many a sigh, Breathe salutary balms through lank-lock'd hair Of sick men's heads, and soon-this world outwornSink into saintly heavens of stirless air, Clean from confessional. One died, this morn, In contemplation, tames the too bright skies Of o'er-rank brightness filtered waterwise Through all the earths in heaven-thou always fair, Still virgin bride of e'er creating thought Dream-worker, in whose dream the Future's wroughtHealer of hurts, free balm for bitter wrongs Most silent mother of all sounding songs— Thou that dissolvest hells to make thy heaven— Thou tempest's heir, that keep'st no tempest leaven- Dost brood, and better thine inheritance- To meditate, yet, by thy walls unpent, Oh! as thou liv'st in all this sky and sea So melt my soul in thee, and thine in me, Gray Pelican, poised where yon broad shallows shine, In the bag below thy beak—yet thine, not less? By moon-horn'd strands that film the far-off air, Bright sparkle-revelations, secret majesties, Shells, wrecks and wealths, are mine; yea, Orange-trees, That lift your small world-systems in the light, Rich sets of round green heavens studded bright Above the serene Gulf to where a bridegroom soul All sounds, that make this morn-quick flights |