Great Poems by American Women (5 page)

Bright, glowing Sappho! child of love and song!
Adown the blueness of long-distant years
Beams forth thy glorious shape, and steals along
Thy melting tones, beguiling us to tears.
Thou priestess of great hearts,
Thrilled with the secret fire
By which a god imparts
The anguish of desire—
For meaner souls be mean content—
Thine was a higher element.

 

Over Leucadia's rock thou leanest yet,
With thy wild song, and all thy locks outspread;
The stars are in thine eyes, the moon hath set—
The night dew falls upon thy radiant head;
And thy resounding lyre—
Ah ! not so wildly sway:
Thy soulful lips inspire
And steal our hearts away!
Swanlike and beautiful, thy dirge
Still moans along the Ægean surge.

 

No unrequited love filled thy lone heart,
But thine infinitude did on thee weigh,
And all the wildness of despair impart,
Stealing the down from Hope's own wing away.
Couldst thou not suffer on,
Bearing the direful pang,
While thy melodious tone
Through wondering cities rang?
Couldst thou not bear thy godlike grief?
In godlike utterance find relief?

 

Devotion, fervor, might upon thee wait:
But what were these to thine? all cold and chill,
And left thy burning heart but desolate;
Thy wondrous beauty with despair might fill
The worshipper who bent
Entranced at thy feet:
Too affluent the dower lent
Where song and beauty meet!
Consumed by a Promethean fire
Wert thou, O daughter of the lyre!

 

Alone, above Leucadia's wave art thou,
Most beautiful, most gifted, yet alone!
Ah! what to thee the crown from Pindar's brow?
What the loud plaudit and the garlands thrown
By the enraptured throng,
When thou in matchless grace
Didst move with lyre and song,
And monarchs gave thee place?
What hast thou left, proud one? what token?
Alas! a lyre and heart—both broken!

A mariner sat on the shrouds one night;

The wind was piping free;

Now bright, now dimmed was the moonlight pale,

And the phosphor gleamed in the wake of the whale,

As he floundered in the sea;

The scud was flying athwart the sky,

The gathering winds went whistling by,

And the wave as it towered, then fell in spray,

Looked an emerald wall in the moonlight ray.

 

The mariner swayed and rocked on the mast,

But the tumult pleased him well;

Down the yawning wave his eye he cast,

And the monsters watched as they hurried past

Or lightly rose and fell;

For their broad, damp fins were under the tide,

And they lashed as they passed the vessel's side,

And their filmy eyes, all huge and grim,

Glared fiercely up, and they glared at him.

 

Now freshens the gale, and the brave ship goes

Like an uncurbed steed along;

A sheet of flame is the spray she throws,

As her gallant prow the water ploughs,

But the ship is fleet and strong:

The topsails are reefed and the sails are furled,

And onward she sweeps o'er the watery world,

And dippeth her spars in the surging flood;

But there came no chill to the mariner's blood.

 

Wildly she rocks, but he swingeth at ease,

And holds him by the shroud;

And as she careens to the crowding breeze,

The gaping deep the mariner sees,

And the surging heareth loud.

Was that a face, looking up at him,

With its pallid cheek and its cold eyes dim?

Did it beckon him down? did it call his name?

Now rolleth the ship the way whence it came.

 

The mariner looked, and he saw with dread

A face he knew too well;

And the cold eyes glared, the eyes of the dead,

And its long hair out on the wave was spread.

Was there a tale to tell?

The stout ship rocked with a reeling speed,

And the mariner groaned, as well he need;

For, ever, down as she plunged on her side,

The dead face gleamed from the briny tide.

 

Bethink thee, mariner, well, of the past,—

A voice calls loud for thee:—

There's a stifled prayer, the first, the last;—

The plunging ship on her beam is cast,—

Oh, where shall thy burial be?

Bethink thee of oaths that were lightly spoken,

Bethink thee of vows that were lightly broken,

Bethink thee of all that is dear to thee,

For thou art alone on the raging sea:

 

Alone in the dark, alone on the wave,

To buffet the storm alone,

To struggle aghast at thy watery grave,

To struggle and feel there is none to save,—

God shield thee, helpless one!

The stout limbs yield, for their strength is past,

The trembling hands on the deep are cast,

The white brow gleams a moment more,

Then slowly sinks—the struggle is o'er.

 

Down, down where the storm is hushed to sleep,

Where the sea its dirge shall swell,

Where the amber drops for thee shall weep,

And the rose-lipped shell her music keep,

There thou shalt slumber well.

The gem and the pearl lie heaped at thy side,

They fell from the neck of the beautiful bride,

From the strong man's hand, from the maiden's brow,

As they slowly sunk to the wave below.

 

A peopled home is the ocean bed;

The mother and child are there;

The fervent youth and the hoary head,

The maid, with her floating locks outspread,

The babe with its silken hair;

As the water moveth they lightly sway,

And the tranquil lights on their features play;

And there is each cherished and beautiful form,

Away from decay, and away from the storm.

Sweet babe, I cannot hope thou wilt be freed
From woes, to all, since earliest time, decreed;
But may'st thou be with resignation blessed,
To bear each evil, howsoe'er distressed.

 

May Hope her anchor lend amid the storm,
And o'er the tempest rear her angel form!
May sweet Benevolence, whose words are peace,
To the rude whirlwinds softly whisper, “Cease!”

 

And may Religion, Heaven's own darling child,
Teach thee at human cares and griefs to smile;
Teach thee to look beyond this world of woe,
To Heaven's high fount, whence mercies ever flow.

 

And when this vale of tears is safely passed—
When Death's dark curtain shuts the scene at last—
May thy freed spirit leave this earthly sod,
And fly to seek the bosom of thy God.

And this was once the realm of Nature, where
Wild as the wind, though exquisitely fair,
She breathed the mountain breeze, or bowed to kiss
The dimpling waters with unbounded bliss.
Here in this Paradise of earth, where first
Wild mountain Liberty began to burst,
Once Nature's temple rose in simple grace,
The hill her throne, the world her dwelling-place.
And where are now her lakes, so still and lone,
Her thousand streams with bending shrubs o‘ergrown?
Where her dark cat'racts tumbling from on high,
With rainbow arch aspiring to the sky?
Her tow'ring pines with fadeless wreaths entwined,
Her waving alders streaming to the wind?
Nor these alone,—her own,—her fav'rite child,
All fire, all feeling; man untaught and wild;
Where can the lost, lone son of Nature stray?
For art's high car is rolling on its way;
A wand'rer of the world, he flies to drown
The thoughts of days gone by and pleasures flown
In the deep draught, whose dregs are death and woe,
With slavery's iron chain concealed below.
Once through the tangled wood, with noiseless tread
And throbbing heart, the lurking warrior sped,
Aimed his sure weapon, won the prize, and turned,
While his high heart with wild ambition burned
With song and war-whoop to his native tree,
There on its bark to carve the victory.
His all of learning did that act comprise,
But still in
nature'
s volume doubly wise.

 

The wayward stream which once, with idle bound,
Whirled on resistless in its foaming round,
Now curbed by art flows on, a wat'ry chain
Linking the snow-capped mountains to the main.
Where once the alder in luxuriance grew,
Or the tall pine its towering branches threw
Abroad to heaven, with dark and haughty brow,
There mark the realms of plenty smiling now;
There the full sheaf of Ceres richly glows,
And Plenty's fountain blesses as it flows;
And man, a brute when left to wander wild,
A reckless creature, Nature's lawless child,
What boundless streams of knowledge rolling now
From the full hand of art around him flow!
Improvement strides the surge, while from afar
Learning rolls onward in her silver car;
Freedom unfurls her banner o'er his head,
While peace sleeps sweetly on her native bed.
The Muse arises from the wild-wood glen,
And chants her sweet and hallowed song again,
As in those halcyon days, which bards have sung,
When hope was blushing, and when life was young.
Thus shall she rise, and thus her sons shall rear
Her sacred temple
here,
and only
here,
While Percival, her loved and chosen priest,
Forever blessing, though himself unblest,
Shall fan the fire that blazes at her shrine,
And charm the ear with numbers half divine.

We deemed the secret lost, the spirit gone,
Which spake in Greek simplicity of thought,
And in the forms of gods and heroes wrought
Eternal beauty from the sculptured stone,—
A higher charm than modern culture won
With all the wealth of metaphysic lore,
Gifted to analyze, dissect, explore.
A many-colored light flows from one sun;
Art, 'neath its beams, a motley thread has spun;
The prism modifies the perfect day;
But thou hast known such mediums to shun,
And cast once more on life a pure, white ray.
Absorbed in the creations of thy mind,
Forgetting daily self, my truest self I find.

The charms of melody, in simple airs,

By human voices sung, are always felt;

With thoughts responsive careless hearers melt,

Of secret ills, which our frail nature bears.

We listen, weep, forget. But when the throng

Of a great master's thoughts, above the reach

Of words or colors, wire and wood can teach

By laws which to the spirit-world belong—

When several parts, to tell one mood combined,

Flash meaning on us we can ne'er express.

Giving to matter subtlest powers of mind,

Superior joys attentive souls confess:

The harmony which suns and stars obey,

Blesses our earth-bound state with visions of supernal day.

'Twas summer, and the spot a cool retreat—
Where curious eyes came not, nor footstep rude
Disturbed the lovers' chosen solitude:
Beneath an oak there was a mossy seat,
Where we reclined, while birds above us wooed
Their mates in songs voluptuously sweet.
A limpid brook went murmuring by our feet,
And all conspired to urge the tender mood.
Methought I touched the streamlet with a flower,
When from its bosom sprang a fountain clear,
Falling again in the translucent shower
Which made more green each blade of grass appear:
“This stream's thy heart,” I said; “Love's touch alone
Can change it to the fount which maketh green my own.”