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STANZAS.

Он, no! my heart can never be Again in lightest hopes the same; The love that lingers there for thee Has more of ashes than of flame. Still deem not but that I am yet

As much as ever all thine own; Though now the soul of love be set On a heart chill'd almost to stone.

And can you marvel? only look

On all that heart has had to bearOn all that it has yet to brook,

And wonder then at its despair.

Oh, love is destiny, and mine

Has long been struggled with in vain ; Victim or votary, at thy shrine

There I am vow'd-there must remain.

My first-my last-my only love,

Oh blame me not for that I dwell On all that I have had to prove

Of Love's despair, of Hope's farewell.

I think upon mine early dreams,
When youth, hope, joy, together sprung;
The gushing forth of mountain streams,
On which no shadow had been flung.
When love seem'd only meant to make
A sunshine on life's silver seas,-
Alas, that we should ever wake,

And wake to weep o'er dreams like these!

I loved, and love was like to me
The spirit of a fairy tale,
When we have but to wish, and be

Whatever wild wish may prevail.

I deem'd that love had power to part
The chains and blossoms of life's thrall,
Make an Elysium of the heart,

And shed its influence over all.
I link'd it with all lovely things,
Beautiful pictures, tones of song,
All those pure, high imaginings,
That but in thought to earth belong.
And all that was unreal became

Reality when blent with thee-
It was but colouring that flame,
More than a lava flood to me.
I was not happy-love forbade

Peace by its feverish restlessness;
But this was sweet, and then I had
Hope, which relies on happiness.

I need not say how, one by one,

Love's flowers have dropp'd from off love's chain; Enough to say that they are gone,

And that they cannot bloom again.

I know not what the pangs may be
That hearts betray'd or slighted prove-

I speak but of the misery

That waits on fond and mutual love.

The torture of an absent hour,

When doubts mock reason's faint control; "Tis fearful thinking of the power

Another holds upon our soul!

To think another has in thrall
All of life's best and dearest part;
Our hopes, affections, trusted all

To that frail bark-the human heart.
To yield thus to another's reign;

To live but in another's breath-
To double all life's powers of pain-
To die twice in another's death;
While these things present to me seem,
And what can now the past restore,
Love as I may, yet I can dream
Of happiness in love no more.

NECESSITY.

In the ancestral presence of the dead
Sits a lone power-a veil upon the head,
Stern with the terror of an unseen dread.
It sitteth cold, immutable, and still,
Girt with eternal consciousness of ill,
And strong and silent as its own dark will.
We are the victims of its iron rule,
The warm and beating human heart its tool;
And man, immortal, godlike, but its fool.
We know not of its presence, though its power
Be on the gradual round of every hour,
Now flinging down an empire, now a flower.
And all things small and careless are its own,
Unwittingly the seed minute is sown,
The tree of evil out of it is grown.

At times we see and struggle with our chain,
And dream that somewhat we are freed, in vain;
The mighty fetters close on us again.

We mock our actual strength with lofty thought,
And towers that look into the heavens are wrought,
But after all our toil the task is naught.
Down comes the stately fabric, and the sands
Are scatter'd with the work of myriad hands,
High o'er whose pride the fragile wild-flower stands.
Such are the wreck of nations and of kings,
Far in the desert, where the palm-tree springs;
"Tis the same story in all meaner things.
The heart builds up its hopes, though not address'd
To meet the sunset glories of the west,
But garner'd in some still, sweet-singing nest.
But the dark power is on its noiseless way,
The song is silent so sweet yesterday,
And not a green leaf lingers on the spray.
We mock ourselves with freedom and with hope,
The while our feet glide down life's faithless slope;
One has no strength, the other has no scope.
So we are flung on time's tumultuous wave,
Forced there to struggle, but denied to save,
Till the stern tide ebbs-and there is the grave.

MEMORY.

I Do not say bequeath unto my soul

Thy memory, I rather ask forgetting; Withdraw, I pray, from me thy strong control, Leave something in the wide world worth regretting.

I need my thoughts for other things than thee,
I dare not let thine image fill them only;
The hurried happiness it wakes in me

WE MIGHT HAVE BEEN!

WE might have been! these are but common words,
And yet they make the sum of life's bewailing;
They are the echo of those finer chords,
Whose music life deplores when unavailing.
We might have been!

We might have been so happy! says the child,
Pent in the weary school-room during summer,

Will leave the hours that are to come more lonely. When the green rushes mid the marshes wild,

I live not like the many of my kind;

Mine is a world of feelings and of fancies, Fancies whose rainbow-empire is the mind, Feelings that realize their own romances. To dream and to create has been my fate, Alone, apart from life's more busy scheming; I fear to think that I may find too late

Vain was the toil, and idle was the dreaming. Have I uprear'd my glorious pyre of thought

Up to the heavens, but for my own entombing? The fair and fragrant things that years have brought, Must they be gather'd for my own consuming? Oh! give me back the past that took no part In the existence it was but surveying; That knew not then of the awaken'd heart Amid the life of other lives decaying. Why should such be mine own? I sought it not: More than content to live apart and lonely, The feverish tumult of a loving lot

Is what I wish'd, and thought to picture only. Surely the spirit is its own free will;

What should o'ermaster mine to vain complying With hopes that call down what they bring of ill, With fears to their own questioning replying?

In vain, in vain! Fate is above us all;

We struggle, but what matters our endeavour? Our doom is gone beyond our own recall,

May we deny or mitigate it? never!

And what art thou to me, thou who dost wake

The mind's still depths with trouble and repining? Nothing; though all things now thy likeness take; Nothing, and life has nothing worth resigning. Ah, yes! one thing, thy memory; though grief Watching the expiring beam of hope's last ember; Life had one hour, bright, beautiful, and brief, And now its only task is to remember.

RESOLVES.

WHAT mockeries are our most firm resolves;
To will is ours, but not to execute.
We map our future like some unknown coast,
And say, "Here is a harbour, here a rock-
The one we will attain, the other shun:"
And we do neither. Some chance gale springs up
And bears us far o'er some unfathom'd sea;
Our efforts are all vain; at length we yield

To winds and waves that laugh at man's control.

And rosy fruits, attend the radiant comer.
We might have been!

It is the thought that darkens on our youth,
When first experience, sad experience, teaches
What fallacies we have believed for truth,
And what few truths endeavour ever reaches.
We might have been!

Alas! how different from what we are

Had we but known the bitter path before us; But feelings, hopes, and fancies left afar, What in the wide bleak world can e'er restore us? We might have been!

It is the motto of all human things,

The end of all that waits on mortal seeking; The weary weight upon Hope's flagging wings, It is the cry of the worn heart while breakingWe might have been!

And when, warm with the heaven that gave it birth,
Dawns on our world-worn way Love's hour
Elysian,

The last fair angel lingering on our earth,
The shadow of what thought obscures the vision?
We might have been!

A cold fatality attends on love,

Too soon or else too late the heart-beat quickens; The star which is our fate springs up above, And we but say, while round the vapour thickens, We might have been!

Life knoweth no like misery; the rest

Are single sorrows, but in this are blended All sweet emotions that disturb the breast; The light that was our loveliest is ended. We might have been!

Henceforth, how much of the full heart must be A sealed book at whose contents we tremble? A still voice mutters mid our misery,

The worst to hear, because it must dissembleWe might have been!

Life is made up of miserable hours,

And all of which we craved a brief possessing, For which we wasted wishes, hopes, and powers, Comes with some fatal drawback on the blessing. We might have been!

The future never renders to the past

The young beliefs intrusted to its keeping; Inscribe one sentence-life's first truth and lastOn the pale marble where our dust is sleepingWe might have been!

A LONG WHILE AGO.

STILL hangeth down the old accustom'd willow,
Hiding the silver underneath each leaf,
So drops the long hair from some maiden pillow,
When midnight heareth the else silent grief;
There floats the water-lily, like a sovereign
Whose lovely empire is a fairy world,
The purple dragon-fly above it hovering,
As when its fragile ivory uncurl'd
A long while ago.

I hear the bees in sleepy music winging [noon-
From the wild thyme when they have pass'd the
There is the blackbird in the hawthorn singing,

Stirring the white spray with the same sweet tune;
Fragrant the tansy breathing from the meadows,
As the west wind bends down the long green grass,
Now dark, now golden, as the fleeting shadows
Of the light clouds past as they wont to pass
A long while ago.

There are the roses which we used to gather
To bind a young fair brow no longer fair;
Ah! thou art mocking us, thou summer weather,
To be so sunny, with the loved one where?
'Tis not her voice-'tis not her step-that lingers
In the lone familiar sweetness on the wind;
The bee, the bird, are now the only singers-
Where is the music once with their's combined
A long while ago?

As the lorn flowers that in her pale hands perish'd
Is she who only hath a memory here.
She was so much a part of us, so cherish'd,
So young, that even love forgot to fear.
Now is her image paramount, it reigneth

With a sad strength that time may not subdue;
And memory a mournful triumph gaineth,
As the slow looks we cast around renew
A long while ago.

Thou lovely garden! where the summer covers The tree with green leaves, and the ground with flowers;

Darkly the past around thy beauty hovers

The past-the grave of our once happy hours. It is too sad to gaze upon the seeming

Of nature's changeless loveliness, and feel [ing
That, with the sunshine round, the heart is dream-
Darkly o'er wounds inflicted, not to heal,
A long while ago.

Ah! visit not the scenes where youth and childhood
Pass'd years that deepen'd as those years went by;
Shadows will darken in the careless wildwood-
There will be tears upon the tranquil sky.
Memories, like phantoms, haunt me while I wander
Beneath the drooping boughs of each old tree:
I grow too sad as mournfully I ponder
Things that are not-and yet that used to be-
A long while ago.

Worn out-the heart seems like a ruin'd altar;
Where are the friends, and where the faith of yore?
My eyes grow dim with tears, my footsteps falter,
Thinking of those whom I can love no more.

We change, and others change, while recollection
Would fain renew what it can but recall.
Dark are life's dreams, and weary its affection,
And cold its hopes, and yet I felt them all
A long while ago.

CAN YOU FORGET ME?

CAN you forget me? I who have so cherish'd
The veriest trifle that was memory's link;
The roses that you gave me, although perish'd,

Were precious in my sight; they made me think
You took them in their scentless beauty stooping
From the warm shelter of the garden wall;
Autumn, while into languid winter drooping
Gave its last blossoms, opening but to fall.
Can you forget them?

Can you forget me? I am not relying

On plighted vows-alas! I know their worth; Man's faith to woman is a trifle, dying

Upon the very breath that gave it birth; But I remember hours of quiet gladness,

When, if the heart had truth, it spoke it then, When thoughts would sometimes take a tone of sadAnd then unconsciously grow glad again. [ness, Can you forget them?

Can you forget me? My whole soul was blended:
At least it sought to blend itself with thine;
My life's whole purpose, winning thee, seem'd ended;
Thou wert my heart's sweet home-my spirit's
shrine.

Can you forget me? when the firelight burning,
Flung sudden gleams around the quiet room,
How would thy words, to long past moments turning,
Trust me with thoughts soft as the shadowy gloom!
Can you forget them?

There is no truth in love, whate'er its seeming, And heaven itself could scarcely seem more true, Sadly have I awaken'd from the dreaming,

Whose charmed slumber, false one! was of you.
I gave mine inmost being to thy keeping-
I had no thought I did not seek to share;
Feelings that hush'd within my soul were sleeping,
Waked into voice to trust them to thy care.
Can you forget them?

Can you forget me? This is vainly tasking
The faithless heart where I, alas! am not.
Too well I know the idleness of asking-
The misery-of why am I forgot?
The happy hours that I have pass'd while kneeling
Half slave, half child, to gaze upon thy face.
-But what to thee this passionate appealing-
Let my heart break-it is a common case.
You have forgotten me.

THE FAREWELL. FAREWELL!

Shadows and scenes that have, for many hours, Been my companions; I part from ye like friendsDear and familiar ones-with deep sad thoughts, And hopes, almost misgivings!

CALYPSO WATCHING THE OCEAN.

YEARS, years have pass'd away,
Since to yonder fated bay

Did the hero come.

Years, years have pass'd the while
Since he left the lovely isle

For his Grecian home.
He is with the dead-but she
Weepeth on eternally

In the lone and lovely island
Mid the far off southern seas.
Downwards floateth her bright hair,
Fair-how exquisitely fair!

But it is unbound.
Never since that parting hour
Golden band or rosy flower

In it has been wound!
There it droopeth sadly bright,
In the morning's sunny light,

On the lone and lovely island
In the far off southern seas.

Like a marble statue placed,
Looking o'er the watery waste,

With its white fix'd gaze;
There the goddess sits, her eye
Raised to the unpitying sky:
So uncounted days
Has she ask'd of yonder main,
Him it will not bring again

To the lone and lovely island
In the far off southern seas.

To that stately brow is given
Loveliness that sprung from heaven-
Is, like heaven, bright:

Never there may time prevail,
But her perfect face is pale;

And a troubled light
Tells of one who may not die,
Vex'd with immortality,

In the lone and lovely island
Mid the far off southern seas.

Desolate beside that strand,
Bow'd upon her cold, white hand,
Is her radiant head;
Silently she sitteth there,
While her large eyes on the air

Traced the much-loved dead:
Eyes that know not tears nor sleep,
Would she not be glad to weep,

In the lone and lovely island
Mid the far off southern seas.

Far behind, the fragrant pile
Sends its odours through the isle ;
And the winds that stir

In the poplars are imbued
With the cedar's precious wood,
With incense and with myrrh,
Till the azure waves beneath
Bear away the scented breath

Of the lone and lovely island
In the far off southern seas.

But no more does that perfume
Hang around the purple loom
Where Calypso wove

Threads of gold with curious skill,
Singing at her own sweet will
Ancient songs of love;
Weary on the sea-wash'd shore,
She will sing those songs no more
In the lone and lovely island
Mid the far off southern seas.
From the large green leaves escape
Clusters of the blooming grape;

Round the shining throne
Still the silver fountains play,
Singing on through night and day,
But they sing alone:
Lovely in their early death,
No one binds a violet wreath,

In the lone and lovely island Mid the far off southern seas. Love and Fate-oh, fearful pair! Terrible in strength ye are;

Until ye had been, Happy as a summer night, Conscious of its own sweet light, Was that Island-queen. Would she could forget to grieve, Or that she could die, and leave The lone and lovely island Mid the far off southern seas. She is but the type of all, Mortal or celestial,

Who allow the heart, In its passion and its power, On some dark and fated hour, To assert its part. Fate attends the steps of Love, Both brought misery from above To the lone and lovely island Mid the far off southern seas.

DESPONDENCY.

Aн, tell me not that memory
Sheds gladness o'er the past;
What is recall'd by faded flowers,

Save that they did not last?
Were it not better to forget,
Than but remember and regret?

Look back upon your hours of youth-
What were your early years,
But scenes of childish cares and griefs?
And say not childish tears
Were nothing; at that time they were
More than the young heart well could bear.
Go on to riper years, and look

Upon your sunny spring;
And from the wrecks of former years,
What will your memory bring?
Affections wasted, pleasures fled,
And hopes now number'd with the dead!

THE WRONGS OF LOVE.

ALAS, how bitter are the wrongs of love!
Life has no other sorrow so acute:
For love is made of every fine emotion,
Of generous impulses, and noble thoughts;
It looketh to the stars, and dreams of heaven;
It nestles mid the flowers, and sweetens earth.
Love is aspiring, yet is humble, too:

It doth exalt another o'er itself,

With sweet heart-homage, which delights to raise
That which it worships; yet is fain to win
The idol to its lone and lowly home
Of deep affection. "Tis an utter wreck
When such hopes perish. From that moment, life
Has in its depths a well of bitterness,
For which there is no healing.

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That brought the bloom to these, the fruit to those,
In the old, old times,
The dear old times.

There was no fountain over marble falling;

But the bees murmur'd one perpetual song,
Like soothing waters, and the birds were calling
Amid the fruit-tree blossoms all day long;
Upon the sunny grass-plot stood the dial,
Whose measured time strange contrast with ours
Ah! was it omen of life's after trial, [made:
That even then the hours were told in shade,
In the old, old times,
The dear old times?

But little reck'd we then of those sick fancies
To which in after life the spirit yields:
Our world was of the fairies and romances

With which we wander'd o'er the summer fields; Then did we question of the down-balls blowing

To know if some slight wish would come to pass; If showers we fear'd, we sought where there was growing

Some weather flower which was our weather glass:
In the old, old times
The dear old times.

Yet my heart warms at these fond recollections,
Breaking the heavy shadow on my day.
Ah! who hath cared for all the deep affections-
The love, the kindness I have thrown away?
The dear old garden! There is now remaining
As little of its bloom as rests with me.
Thy only memory is this sad complaining,
Mourning that never more for us can be
The old, old times,

The dear old times.

CRESCENTIUS.

I LOOK'D upon his brow, no sign
Of guilt or fear was there;

He stood as proud by that death-shrine
As even o'er Despair

He had a power; in his eye
There was a quenchless energy,

A spirit that could dare

The deadliest form that Death could take, And dare it for the daring's sake.

He stood, the fetters on his hand,

He raised them haughtily;
And had that grasp been on the brand,
It could not wave on high

With freer pride than it waved now.
Around he look'd with changeless brow
On many a torture nigh:

The rack, the chain, the axe, the wheel,
And worst of all, his own red steel.

I saw him once before; he rode
Upon a coal-black steed,
And tens of thousands throng'd the road
And bade their warrior speed.
His helm, his breastplate, were of gold,
And graved with many a dint that told

Of many a soldier's deed;
The sun shone on his sparkling mail,
And danced his snow-plume on the gale.

But now he stood chain'd and alone,
The headsman by his side;
The plume, the helm, the charger, gone;

The sword, which had defied
The mightiest, lay broken near;
And yet no sign or sound of fear

Came from that lip of pride;
And never king or conqueror's brow
Wore higher look than his did now.

He bent beneath the headsman's stroke
With an uncover'd eye;

A wild shout from the numbers broke
Who throng'd to see him die.
It was a people's loud acclaim,
The voice of anger and of shame,
A nation's funeral cry,
Rome's wail above her only son,
Her patriot, and her latest one.

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