There, at morn's rosy birth, Thou lookest meekly through the kindling air, Chases the day, beholds thee watching there; There noontide finds thee, and the hour that calls The shapes of polar flame to scale heaven's azure walls. Alike, beneath thine eye, The deeds of darkness and of light are done; Towns blaze-the smoke of battle blots the sun- And the strong wind of day doth mingle sea and cloud. On thy unaltering blaze The half-wrecked mariner, his compass lost, Fixes his steady gaze, And steers, undoubting, to the friendly coast; And they who stray in perilous wastes, by night, Are glad when thou dost shine to guide their footsteps right. And, therefore, bards of old, Sages, and hermits of the solemn wood, Did in thy beams behold A beauteous type of that unchanging good, The voyager of time should shape his heedful way. THE LAPSE OF TIME. LAMENT who will, in fruitless tears, The speed with which our moments fly; I sigh not over vanished years, But watch the years that hasten by. Look, how they come,—a mingled crowd What! grieve that time has brought so soon The sober age of manhood on! As idly might I weep, at noon, To see the blush of morning gone. Could I give up the hopes that glow With all her promises and smiles? The future-cruel were the power Whose doom would tear thee from my heart. Thou sweetener of the present hour! We cannot-no-we will not part. Oh, leave me, still, the rapid flight The months that touch, with added grace, In whose arch eye and speaking face The years, that o'er each sister land Shall lift the country of my birth, And nurse her strength, till she shall stand Till younger commonwealths, for aid, True-time will seam and blanch my brow- And my good glass will tell me how And then should no dishonour lie Upon my head, when I am gray, Love yet shall watch my fading eye, And smooth the path of my decay. Then haste thee, Time-'tis kindness all Thou fliest and bear'st away our woes, And as thy shadowy train depart, The memory of sorrow grows A lighter burden on the heart. SONG OF THE STARS. WHEN the radiant morn of creation broke, And the empty realms of darkness and death And orbs of beauty and spheres of flame From the void abyss by myriads came, In the joy of youth as they darted away, And this was the song the bright ones sang: “Away, away, through the wide, wide sky, Each sun with the worlds that round him roll, With her isles of green, and her clouds of white, |