HAVE SANDALPHON. you read in the Talmud of old, In the Legends the Rabbins have told Of the limitless realms of the air,— Have you read it, the marvellous story Of Sandalphon, the Angel of Glory, Sandalphon, the Angel of Prayer? How, erect, at the outermost gates With his feet on the ladder of light, That, crowded with angels unnumbered, By Jacob was seen, as he slumbered Alone in the desert at night? The Angels of Wind and of Fire With the song's irresistible stress; But serene in the rapturous throng, With eyes unimpassioned and slow, Among the dead angels, the deathless Sandalphon stands listening breathless To sounds that ascend from below;— From the spirits on earth that adore, From the souls that entreat and implore In the fervour and passion of prayer; From the hearts that are broken with losses, And weary with dragging the crosses Too heavy for mortals to bear. And he gathers the prayers as he stands, And beneath the great arch of the portal, It is but a legend, I know,— Of the ancient Rabbinical lore; When I look from my window at night, All throbbing and panting with stars, And the legend, I feel, is a part EPIMETHEUS, OR THE POET'S AFTERTHOUGHT. HAVE I dreamed? or was it real, What I saw as in a vision, When to marches hymeneal, In the land of the ideal, Moved my thought o'er fields Elysian? What! are these the guests whose glances As with magic circles, bound me? Ah! how cold are their caresses! Pallid cheeks and haggard bosoms! O my songs! whose winsome measures Fair they seemed, those songs sonorous, In the dark of branches hidden. Disenchantment! Disillusion! Not with steeper fall nor faster, Icarus fell with shattered pinions! Sweet Pandora! dear Pandora! If to win thee is to hate thee? No, not hate thee! for this feeling O'er the chords of our existence. Him whom thou dost once enamour, Weary hearts by thee are lifted, Struggling souls by thee are strengthened. Clouds of fear asunder rifted, Truth from falsehood cleansed and sifted, Lives, like days in summer, lengthened. Therefore art thou ever dearer, For thou makest each mystery clearer, When thou fillest my heart with fever! Muse of all the Gifts and Graces! Though the fields around us wither, |