Графични страници
PDF файл
ePub

This may be pardoned-something rare
In loveliness has been thy snare!
But how, fair Love, canst thou become
A thing of mines-a sordid gnome?

And she whom JULIAN left-she stood
A cold white statue; as the blood
Had, when in vain her last wild prayer,
Flown to her heart, and frozen there.
Upon her temple, each dark vein
Swelled in its agony of pain.

Chill, heavy damps were on her brow;

Her arms were stretched at length, though now
Their clasp was on the empty air:

A funeral pall-her long black hair
Fell over her; herself the tomb

Of her own youth, and breath, and bloom.

Alas! that man should ever win So sweet a shrine to shame and sin As woman's heart;-and deeper woe For her fond weakness, not to know That yielding all but breaks the chain That never reunites again!

It was a dark and tempest night-
No pleasant moon, no blest starlight;
But meteors glancing o'er the way,
Only to dazzle and betray.

And who is she that, 'mid the storm,
Wraps her slight mantle round her form?
Her hair is wet with rain and sleet,
And blood is on her small snow feet.
She has been forced a way to make
Through prickly weed and thorned brake,
Up rousing from its coil the snake ;
And stirring from their damp abode
The slimy worm and loathsome toad ·
And shuddered as she heard the gale
Shriek like an evil spirit's wail;
When followed, like a curse, the crash
Of the pines in the lightning flash :-
A place of evil and of fear-

Oh! what can JULIAN'S love do here?

On, on the pale girl went.

At last

The gloomy forest depths are past,
And she has reached the wizard's den,
Accursed by God and shunned by men.
And never had a ban been laid
Upon a more unwholesome shade.
There grew dank elders, and the yew
Its thick sepulchral shadow threw ;
And brooded there each bird most foul,
The gloomy bat and sullen owl.

But IDA entered in the cell,
Where dwelt the wizard of the dell.

[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small]

53

Her heart lay dead, her life-blood froze
To look upon the shape which rose
To bar her entrance. On that face
Was scarcely left a single trace
Of human likeness: the parched skin
Showed each discoloured bone within;
And, but for the most evil stare
Of the wild eyes' unearthly glare,
It was a corpse, you would have said,
From which life's freshness long had fled.
Yet IDA knelt her down and prayed ·
To that dark sorcerer for his aid.
He heard her prayer with withering look ;
Then from unholy herbs he took
A drug, and said it would recover
The lost heart of her faithless lover.
She trembled as she turned to see
His demon sneer's malignity;

And every step was winged with dread,
To hear the curse howled as she fled.

It is the purple twilight hour,
And JULIAN is in IDA's bower.

He has brought gold, as gold could bless
His work of utter desolateness !

He has brought gems, as if Despair

Had any pride of being fair!

But IDA only wept, and wreathed

Her white arms round his neck; then breathed

Those passionate complaints that wring

A woman's heart, yet never bring
Redress. She called upon each tree
To witness her lone constancy!
She called upon the silent boughs,
The temple of her JULIAN'S vows
Of happiness too dearly bought!
Then wept again. At length she thought
Upon the forest sorcerer's gift-
The last, lone hope that love had left!
She took the cup, and kissed the brim
Mixed the dark spell, and gave it him
To pledge his once dear IDA's name!
He drank it. Instantly the flame
Ran through his veins: one fiery throb
Of bitter pain-one gasping sob
Of agony-the cold death-sweat
Is on his face-his teeth are set-
His bursting eyes are glazed and still:
The drug has done its work of ill.
Alas! for her who watched each breath,
The cup her love had mixed bore-death.

LORENZO !-when next morning came,
For the first time I heard thy name!
ATHENEUM VOL. 2. 2d series.

LORENZO !-how each ear-pulse drank
The more than music of that tone;
LORENZO !-how I sighed that name,

As breathing it, made it mine own!
I sought the gallery: I was wont
Το pass the noontide there, and trace
Some statue's shape of loveliness-

Some saint, some nymph, or muse's face.
There in my rapture I could throw
My pencil and its hues aside,
And, as the vision past me, pour
My song of passion, joy, and pride.
And he was there,-LORENZO there!
How soon the morning past away,
With finding beauties in each thing

Neither had seen before that day!
Spirit of Love! soon thy rose-plumes wear
The weight and the sully of canker and care:
Falsehood is round thee; Hope leads thee on,
Till every hue from thy pinions is gone.
But one bright moment is all thine own,
The one ere thy visible presence is known;
When, like the wind of the south, thy power,
Sunning the heavens, sweetening the flower,
Is felt, but not seen. Thou art sweet and calm
As the sleep of a child, as the dew-fall of balm.
Fear has not darkened thee; Hope has not made
The blossoms expand, it but opens to fade.
Nothing is known of those wearing fears
Which will shadow the light of thy after years.
Then art thou bliss:-but once throw by
The veil which shrouds thy divinity;
Stand confessed,-and thy quiet is fled !
Wild flashes of rapture may come instead,
But pain will be with them. What may restore
The gentle happiness known before?

I owned not to myself I loved,

No word of love LORENZO breathed;

But I lived in a magic ring,

Of every pleasant flower wreathed.
A brighter blue was on the sky,
A sweeter breath in music's sigh;
The orange shrubs all seemed to bear
Fruit more rich, and buds more fair.
There was a glory on the noon,
A beauty in the crescent moon,
A lulling stillness in the night,
A feeling in the pale starlight.
There was a charmed note on the wind,
A spell in Poetry's deep store-
Heart-uttered words, passionate thoughts,
Which I had never marked before.
"Twas as my heart's full happiness
Poured over all its own excess.

One night there was a gorgeous feast

For maskers in COUNT LEON's hall;

And all of gallant, fair, and young,
Were bidden to the festival.
I went, garbed as a Hindoo girl;
Upon each arm an amulet,
And by my side a little lute

Of sandal-wood with gold beset.
And shall I own that I was proud
To hear, amid the gazing crowd,
A murmur of delight, when first

My mask and veil aside I threw ?
For well my conscious cheek betrayed
Whose eye was gazing on me too!
And never yet had praise been dear,
As on that evening, to mine ear.
LORENZO! I was proud to be
Worshipped and flattered but for thee!

THE HINDOO GIRL'S SONG.

PLAYFUL and wild as the fire-flies' light,
This moment hidden, the next moment bright,
Like the foam on the dark-green sea,

Is the spell that is laid on my lover by me.
Were your sigh as sweet as the sumbal's sigh,
When the wind of the evening is nigh;
Were your smile like that glorious light,
Seen when the stars gem the deep midnight;

Were that sigh and that smile for ever the same-
They were shadows, not fuel, to love's dulled flame.

'Love once formed an amulet,

2

With pearls, and a rainbow, and rose-leaves set.
The pearls were pure as pearls could be,

And white as maiden purity;

The rose had the beauty and breath of soul,

And the rain-bow changes crowned the whole.

Frown on your lover one little while,

Dearer will be the light of your smile;

Let your blush, laugh, and sigh ever mingle together,

Like the bloom, sun, and clouds of the sweet spring weather.

Love never must sleep in security,

Or most calm and cold will his waking be.

And as that light strain died away,
Again I swept the breathing strings:
But now the notes I waked were sad
As those the pining wood-dove sings.

THE INDIAN BRIDE.

SHE has lighted her lamp and crowned it with flowers,

The sweetest that breathed of the summer hours.

Red and white roses linked in a band,

Like a maiden's blush or a maiden's hand;

Jasmines,—some like silver spray,
Some like gold in the morning ray;
Fragrant stars, and favourites they,
When Indian girls, on a festival-day,

Braid their dark tresses: and over all weaves
The rosy bower of lotus leaves-

Canopy suiting the lamp-lighted bark,
Love's own flowers, and Love's own ark.

She watched the sky, the sunset grew dim;
She raised to CAMDEO her evening hymn.
The scent of the night-flowers came on the air;
And then, like a bird escaped from the snare,
She flew to the river-(no moon was bright,
But the stars and the fire-flies gave her their light);
She stood beneath the mangoes shade,
Half delighted and half afraid;

She trimmed the lamp, and breathed on each bloom,
(Oh, that breath was sweeter than all their perfume!)
Threw spices and oil on the spire of flame,
Called thrice on her absent lover's name;
And every pulse throbbed as she gave
Her little boat to the Ganges' wave.

There are a thousand fanciful things
Linked round the young heart's imaginings.
In its first love-dream, a leaf or a flower
Is gifted then with a spell and a power:
A shade is an omen, a dream is a sign,
From which the maiden can well divine
Passion's whole history. Those only can tell
Who have loved as young hearts can love so well,
How the pulses will beat, and the cheek will be dyed,
When they have some love-augury tried,

Oh, it is not for those whose feelings are cold,
Withered by care, or blunted by gold;

Whose brows have darkened with many years,
To feel again youth's hopes and fears-
What they now might blush to confess,
Yet what made their spring-day's happiness!

ZADIE watched her flower-built vessel glide,
Mirrored beneath on the deep-blue tide ;
Lovely and lonely, scented and bright,
Like Hope's own bark, all bloom and light.
There's not one breath of wind on the air,
The heavens are cloudless, the waters are fair,
No dew is falling; yet woe to that shade!
The maiden is weeping-her lamp has decayed.
Hark to the ring of the cymetar !

It tells that the soldier returns from afar,
Down from the mountains the warriors come:
Hark to the thunder-roll of the drum!

To the startling voice of the trumpet's call !
To the cymbal's clash!-to the atabal!
The banners of crimson float in the sun,

The warfare is ended, the battle is won.

The mother hath taken the child from her breast,

And raised it to look on its father's crest.

The pathway is lined, as the bands pass along,

With maidens, who meet them with flowers and song.
And ZADIE hath forgotten in Azıм's arms
All her so false lamp's falser alarms.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

T

« ПредишнаНапред »