The courses of the stars; the very hour He knows when they shall darken or grow bright; Push me, with soft and inoffensive pace, Or do the portals of another life Even now, while I am glorying in my strength, At that broad threshold, with what fairer forms THE PAINTED CUP. THE fresh savannas of the Sangamon Here rise in gentle swells, and the long grass Is mixed with rustling hazels. Scarlet tufts Are glowing in the green, like flakes of fire; The wanderers of the prairie know them well, And call that brilliant flower the Painted Cup. Now, if thou art a poet, tell me not But leave these scarlet cups to spotted moths To swell the reddening fruit that even now Breathes a slight fragrance from the sunny slope. But thou art of a gayer fancy. WellLet then the gentle Manitou of flowers, Lingering amid the bloomy waste he loves, Though all his swarthy worshippers are goneSlender and small, his rounded cheek all brown And ruddy with the sunshine; let him come On summer mornings, when the blossoms wake, And part with little hands the spiky grass; And touching, with his cherry lips, the edge Of these bright beakers, drain the gathered dew A DREAM. I HAD a dream -a strange, wild dream Said a dear voice at early light; And even yet its shadows seem To linger in my waking sight. Earth, green with spring, and fresh with dew, And bright with morn, before me stood; And airs just wakened softly blew On the young blossoms of the wood. Birds sang within the sprouting shade, And children prattled as they played Beside the rivulet's dimpling glass. Fast climbed the sun: the flowers were flown, There played no children in the glen; For some were gone, and some were grown To blooming dames and bearded men. 'Twas noon, 'twas summer: I beheld Woods darkening in the flush of day, And that bright rivulet spread and swelled, A mighty stream, with creek and bay. And here was love, and there was strife, Now stooped the sun-the shades grew thin; The river heaved with sullen sounds; Still waned the day; the wind that chased The woods were stripped, the fields were waste, And of the young, and strong, and fair, A lonely remnant, gray and weak, |