Great Poems by American Women (4 page)

Oh! would I were as firm and cold
As rock that guards some barren isle
And ever bears an aspect bold,
Unmoved though heaven frown or smile,

 

Heeding alike the dashing wave
That rages 'gainst its beaten breast,
And the soft sea-bird in its cave
By parent bosom gently prest.

 

But such a rock's frail weed, all white
With the wild ocean-spray would be,
When wandering day-beams lend it light,
A meeter simile for me.

 

When smiles bedeck the face of heaven
It sparkles back a kindred ray—
But, come one angry blast, 'tis driven
And all its lustre dashed away.

 

Oh! never was I doomed to know
Thine influence, sweet tranquillity,
But to endure whole months of woe
For every throb of ecstasy.

 

Would I could meet thee, marble death—
Feel undismayed thy cold embrace,
In thy dark bed resign my breath,
For such the only resting place.

Day, in melting purple dying,
Blossoms, all around me sighing,
Fragrance, from the lilies straying,
Zephyr, with my ringlets playing,

Thou, to whom I love to hearken,
Come, ere night around me darken;
Though thy softness but deceive me,
Say thou'rt true, and I'll believe thee;

Save thy toiling, spare thy treasure:
All I ask is friendship's pleasure;
Let the shining ore lie darkling,
Bring no gem in lustre sparkling!

Tell to thee the highwrought feeling,
Ecstasy but in revealing;
Paint to thee the deep sensation,
Rapture in participation,

Absent still! Ah! come and bless me!
Let these eyes again caress thee;
Once, in caution, I could fly thee:
Now, I nothing could deny thee;

Few, in the days of early youth,
Trusted like me in love and truth.
I've learned sad lessons from the years;
But slowly, and with many tears;
For God made me to kindly view
The world that I was passing through.

 

How little did I once believe
That friendly tones could e'er deceive!
That kindness, and forbearance long,
Might meet ingratitude and wrong!
I could not help but kindly view
The world that I was passing through.

 

And though I've learned some souls are base,
I would not, therefore, hate the race;
I still would bless my fellow men,
And trust them, though deceived again.
God help me still to kindly view
The world that I am passing through!

 

Through weary conflicts I have passed,
And struggled into rest at last;
Such rest as when the rack has broke
A joint, or nerve, at every stroke.
The wish survives to kindly view
The world that I am passing through.

 

From all that fate has brought to me
I strive to learn humility,
And trust in Him who rules above,
Whose universal law is love.
Thus only can I kindly view
The world that I am passing through.

When I approach the setting sun,
And feel my journey nearly done,
May earth be veiled in genial light,
And her last smile to me seem bright!
Help me till then to kindly view
The world that I am passing through!

 

And all who tempt a trusting heart
From faith and hope to drift apart,—
May they themselves be spared the pain
Of losing power to trust again!
God help us all to kindly view
The world that we are passing through!

Over the river, and through the wood,
To grandfather's house we go;
The horse knows the way,
To carry the sleigh,
Through the white and drifted snow.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
To grandfather's house away!
We would not stop
For doll or top,
For 't is Thanksgiving day.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
Oh, how the wind does blow!
It stings the toes,
And bites the nose,
As over the ground we go.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
With a clear blue winter sky,
The dogs do bark,
And children hark,
As we go jingling by.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
To have a first-rate play—
Hear the bells ring
Ting a ling ding,
Hurra for Thanksgiving day!

 

Over the river, and through the wood—
No matter for winds that blow;
Or if we get
The sleigh upset,
Into a bank of snow.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
To see little John and Ann;
We will kiss them all,
And play snow-ball,
And stay as long as we can.

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
Trot fast, my dapple grey!
Spring over the ground,
Like a hunting hound,
For 't is Thanksgiving day!

 

Over the river, and through the wood,
And straight through the barn-yard gate;
We seem to go
Extremely slow,
It is so hard to wait.

 

Over the river, and through the wood—
Old Jowler hears our bells;
He shakes his pow,
With a loud bow wow,
And thus the news he tells.

 

Over the river, and through the wood—
When grandmother sees us come,
She will say, Oh dear,
The children are here,
Bring a pie for every one.

 

Over the river, and through the wood—
Now grandmother's cap I spy!
Hurra for the fun!
Is the pudding done?
Hurra for the pumpkin pie!

If thy sad heart, pining for human love,
In its earth solitude grew dark with fear,
Lest the high Sun of Heaven itself should prove
Powerless to save from that phantasmal sphere
Wherein thy spirit wandered,—if the flowers
That pressed around thy feet, seemed but to bloom
In lone Gethsemanes, through starless hours,
When all who loved had left thee to thy doom,—
Oh, yet believe that in that hollow vale
Where thy soul lingers, waiting to attain
So much of Heaven's sweet grace as shall avail
To lift its burden of remorseful pain,
My soul shall meet thee, and its Heaven forego
Till God's great love, on both, one hope, one Heaven bestow.

Vainly my heart had with thy sorceries striven:
It had no refuge from thy love,—no Heaven
But in thy fatal presence;—from afar
It owned thy power and trembled like a star
O'erfraught with light and splendor. Could I deem
How dark a shadow should obscure its beam?—
Could I believe that pain could ever dwell
Where thy bright presence cast its blissful spell?
Thou wert my proud palladium;—could I fear
The avenging Destinies when thou wert near?—
Thou
wert my Destiny;—thy song, thy fame,
The wild enchantments clustering round thy name,
Were my soul's heritage, its royal dower;
Its glory and its kingdom and its power!

On our lone pathway bloomed no earthly hopes:
Sorrow and death were near us, as we stood
Where the dim forest, from the upland slopes,
Swept darkly to the sea. The enchanted wood
Thrilled, as by some foreboding terror stirred;
And as the waves broke on the lonely shore,
In their low monotone, methought I heard
A solemn voice that sighed, “Ye meet no more.”
There, while the level sunbeams seemed to burn
Through the long aisles of red, autumnal gloom,—
Where stately, storied cenotaphs inurn
Sweet human hopes, too fair on Earth to bloom,—
Was the bud reaped, whose petals pure and cold
Sleep on my heart till Heaven the flower unfold.

When the peach ripens to a rosy bloom,
When purple grapes glow through the leafy gloom
Of trellised vines, bright wonder, thou dost come,
Cool as a star dropt from night's azure dome,
To light the early morning, that doth break
More softly beautiful for thy sweet sake.

 

Thy fleeting glory to my fancy seems
Like the strange flowers we gather in our dreams;
Hovering so lightly o'er the slender stem,
Wearing so meekly the proud diadem
Of penciled rays, that gave the name you bear
Unblamed amid the flowers, from year to year.
The tawny lily, flecked with jetty studs,
Pard-like, and dropping through long, pendent buds,
Her purple anthers; nor the poppy, bowed
In languid sleep, enfolding in a cloud
Of drowsy odors her too fervid heart,
Pierced by the day-god's barbed and burning dart;
Nor the swart sunflower, her dark brows enrolled
With their broad carcanets of living gold,—
A captive princess, following the car
Of her proud conqueror; nor that sweet star,
The evening primrose, pallid with strange dreams
Born of the wan moon's melancholy beams;
Nor any flower that doth its tendrils twine
Around my memory, hath a charm like thine.
Child of the morning, passionless and fair
As some ethereal creature of the air,
Waiting not for the bright lord of the hours
To weary of thy bloom in sultry bowers;
Nor like the summer rose, that one by one,
Yields her fair, fragrant petals to the sun,
Faint with the envenomed sweetness of his smile,
That doth to lingering death her race beguile;
But, as some spirit of the air doth fade
Into the light from its own essence rayed,
So, Glory of the morning, fair and cold,
Soon in thy circling halo dost thou fold
Thy virgin bloom, and from our vision hide
That form too fair, on earth, unsullied to abide.

He woos me with those honeyed words

That women love to hear,

Those gentle flatteries that fall

So sweet on every ear:

He tells me that my face is fair,

Too fair for grief to shade;

My cheek, he says, was never meant

In sorrow's gloom to fade.

 

He stands beside me when I sing

The songs of other days,

And whispers, in love's thrilling tones,

The words of heartfelt praise;

And often in my eyes he looks,

Some answering love to see;

In vain—he there can only read

The faith of memory.

 

He little knows what thoughts awake

With every gentle word;

How, by his looks and tones, the founts

Of tenderness are stirred:

The visions of my youth return,

Joys far too bright to last,

And while he speaks of future bliss,

I think but of the past.

 

Like lamps in eastern sepulchres,

Amid my heart's deep gloom,

Affection sheds its holiest light

 

Upon my husband's tomb:

And as those lamps, if brought once more

To upper air grow dim,

So my soul's love is cold and dead,

Unless it glow for him.

They tell me that I must not love,

That thou wilt spurn the free

And unbought tenderness that gives

Its hidden wealth to thee.

It may be so: I heed it not,

Nor would I change my blissful lot,

When thus I am allowed to make

My heart a bankrupt for thy sake.

 

They tell me when the fleeting charm

Of novelty is o'er,

Thou 'It turn away with careless brow

And think of me no more.

It may be so! enough for me

If sunny skies still smile o'er thee,

Or I can trace, when thou art far,

Thy pathway like a distant star.

A gentle maiden, whose large loving eyes

Enshrine a tender, melancholy light,

Like the soft radiance of the starry skies,

Or Autumn sunshine, mellowed when most bright,

She is not sad, yet in her look appears

Something that makes the gazer think of tears.

 

She is not beautiful, her features bear

A loveliness by angel hands impressed,

Such as the pure in heart alone may wear,

The outward symbol of a soul at rest;

And this beseems her well, for Love and Truth

Companion ever with her guileless youth.

 

She hath a delicate foot, a dainty hand,

And every limb displays unconscious grace,

Like one, who, born a lady in the land,

Taketh no thought how best to fill her place,

But moveth ever at her own sweet will,

While gentleness and pride attend her still.

 

Nor has she lost, by any sad mischance,

The happy thoughts that to her years belong—

Her step is ever fleetest in the dance,

Her voice is ever gayest in the song;

The silent air by her rich notes is stirred,

As by the music of a forest bird.

 

There dwelleth in the sinlessness of youth

A sweet rebuke that Vice may not endure;

And thus she makes an atmosphere of truth,

For all things in her presence grow more pure;

She walks in light—her guardian angel flings

A halo round her from his radiant wings.