TO A CLOUD. BEAUTIFUL cloud! with folds so soft and fair, Thy fleeces bathed in sunlight, while below Beautiful cloud! I would I were with thee To rest on thy unrolling skirts, and look On Earth as on an open book; On streams that tie her realms with silver bands, To where the sun of Andalusia shines On his own olive-groves and vines, Or the soft lights of Italy's bright sky In smiles upon her ruins lie. But I would woo the winds to let us rest O'er Greece long fettered and oppressed, Whose sons at length have heard the call that comes And risen, and drawn the sword, and on the foe And the Othman power is cloven, and the stroke And thou reflect upon the sacred ground Bright meteor! for the summer noontide made! The sun, that fills with light each glistening fold, The blast shall rend thy skirts, or thou mayst frown Miss thee, for ever, from the sky. THE MURDERED TRAVELLER. WHEN spring, to woods and wastes around, Brought bloom and joy again, The murdered traveller's bones were found, Far down a narrow glen. The fragrant birch, above him, hung Her tassels in the sky; And many a vernal blossom sprung, And nodded careless by. The red-bird warbled, as he wrought His hanging nest o'erhead, And fearless, near the fatal spot, But there was weeping far away, And gentle eyes, for him, With watching many an anxious day, Were sorrowful and dim. They little knew, who loved him so, The fearful death he met, When shouting o'er the desert snow, Nor how, when round the frosty pole The mountain wolf and wild-cat stole To banquet on the dead ; Nor how, when strangers found his bones, They dressed the hasty bier, And marked his grave with nameless stones, Unmoistened by a tear. But long they looked, and feared, and wept, Within his distant home; And dreamed, and started as they slept, For joy that he was come. Long, long they looked-but never spied His welcome step again, Nor knew the fearful death he died Far down that narrow glen. HYMN TO THE NORTH STAR. THE sad and solemn night Hath yet her multitude of cheerful fires; The glorious host of light Walk the dark hemisphere till she retires; All through her silent watches, gliding slow, Her constellations come, and climb the heavens, and go. Day, too, hath many a star To grace his gorgeous reign, as bright as they: Through the blue fields afar, Unseen, they follow in his flaming way: Many a bright lingerer, as the eve grows dim, Tells what a radiant troop arose and set with him. And thou dost see them rise, Star of the Pole! and thou dost see them set. Alone, in thy cold skies, Thou keep'st thy old unmoving station yet, Nor dipp'st thy virgin orb in the blue western main. |