Happiness

One memory trembles on our lips;
It throbs in every breast;
In tear-dimmed eyes, in mirth's eclipse,
The shadow stands confessed.

O silent voice, that cheered so long
Our manhood's marching day,
Without thy breath of heavenly song,
How weary seems the way!

Vain every pictured phrase to tell
Our sorrowing heart's desire, -
The shattered harp, the broken shell,
The silent unstrung lyre;

For youth was round us while he sang;
It glowed in every tone;
With bridal chimes the echoes rang,
And made the past our own.

Oh blissful dream! Our nursery joys
We know must have an end,
But love and friendship's broken toys
May God's good angels mend!

The cheering smile, the voice of mirth
And laughter's gay surprise
T...

In evening as the sun goes down
She twists and dances mindlessly
Life, in her brash effrontery.
But also, when above the town

The night has risen, charming, vast,
Blessing the hungry with its peace,
Obliterating all disgrace,
The Poet tells himself: 'At last!

My spirit, like my backbone, seems
Intent on finding its repose;
The heart so full of mournful dreams,

I'll stretch out on my weary back
And roll up in your curtains, those
Consoling comforters of black!'

I.

    Oppress'd with grief, oppress'd with care,
    A burden more than I can bear,
        I set me down and sigh:
    O life! thou art a galling load,
    Along a rough, a weary road,
        To wretches such as I!
    Dim-backward as I cast my view,
        What sick'ning scenes appear!
    What sorrows yet may pierce me thro'
        Too justly I may fear!
            Still caring, despairing,
                Must be my bitter doom;
            My woes here shall close ne'er
                But with the closing tomb!

II.

    Happy, ye sons of busy life,
    Who, equal to the bustling strife,
        No other view regard!
    Ev'n when the wished end's deny'd,
    Yet while the busy means are ply'd,
        They b...

I

The faery beam upon you,
The stars to glister on you;
A moon of light
In the noon of night,
Till the fire-drake hath o’ergone you!
The wheel of fortune guide you,
The boy with the bow beside you;
Run ay in the way
Till the bird of day,
And the luckier lot betide you!

II

To the old, long life and treasure!
To the young all health and pleasure!
To the fair, their face
With eternal grace
And the soul to be loved at leisure!
To the witty, all clear mirrors;
To the foolish, their dark errors;
To the loving sprite,
A secure delight;
To the jealous, his own false terrors!

Ah, Almon Keefer! what a boy you were,
With your back-tilted hat and careless hair,
And open, honest, fresh, fair face and eyes
With their all-varying looks of pleased surprise
And joyous interest in flower and tree,
And poising humming-bird, and maundering bee.

The fields and woods he knew; the tireless tramp
With gun and dog; and the night-fisher's camp -
No other boy, save Bee Lineback, had won
Such brilliant mastery of rod and gun.
Even in his earliest childhood had he shown
These traits that marked him as his father's own.
Dogs all paid Almon honor and bow-wowed
Allegiance, let him come in any crowd
Of rabbit-hunting town-boys, even though
His own dog "Sleuth" rebuked their acting so
With jealous snarls and growlings.

    But the best

How fair doth Nature

Appear again!
How bright the sunbeams!

How smiles the plain!

The flow'rs are bursting

From ev'ry bough,
And thousand voices

Each bush yields now.

And joy and gladness

Fill ev'ry breast!
Oh earth! oh sunlight!

Oh rapture blest!

Oh love! oh loved one!

As golden bright,
As clouds of morning

On yonder height!

Thou blessest gladly

The smiling field,
The world in fragrant

Vapour conceal'd.

Oh maiden, maiden,

How love I thee!
Thine eye, how gleams it!

How lov'st thou me!

The blithe lark loveth

Sweet song and air,
The morning flow'ret

Heav'n's incense fair,

As I no...

When by the wall the tiger-flower swings
A head of sultry slumber and aroma;
And by the path, whereon the blown rose flings
Its obsolete beauty, the long lilies foam a
White place of perfume, like a beautiful breast -
Between the pansy fire of the west,
And poppy mist of moonrise in the east,
This heartache will have ceased.

The witchcraft of soft music and sweet sleep -
Let it beguile the burthen from my spirit,
And white dreams reap me as strong reapers reap
The ripened grain and full blown blossom near it;
Let me behold how gladness gives the whole
The transformed countenance of my own soul -
Between the sunset and the risen moon
Let sorrow vanish soon.

And these things then shall keep me company:
The elfins of the dew; the spirit of laught...

Would some little joy to-day
Visit us, heart!
Could it but a moment stay,
Then depart,
With the flutter of its wings
Stirring sense of brighter things.
Like a butterfly astray
In a dark room;
Telling: Outside there is day,
Sweet flowers bloom,
Birds are singing, trees are green
Runnels ripple silver sheen.
Heart! we now have been so long
Sad without change,
Shut in deep from shine and song
Nor can range;
It would do us good to know
That the world is not all woe.
Would some little joy to-day
Visit us, heart!
Could it but a moment stay,
Then depart,
With the luster of its wings
Lighting dreams of happy things,
O sad my heart!

"Under the flag
Of each his faction, they to battle bring
Their embryo atoms."
- Milton.


Welcome joy, and welcome sorrow,
Lethe's weed and Hermes' feather;
Come to-day, and come to-morrow,
I do love you both together!
I love to mark sad faces in fair weather;
And hear a merry laugh amid the thunder;
Fair and foul I love together.
Meadows sweet where flames are under,
And a giggle at a wonder;
Visage sage at pantomine;
Funeral, and steeple-chime;
Infant playing with a skull;
Morning fair, and shipwreck'd hull;
Nightshade with the woodbine kissing;
Serpents in red roses hissing;
Cleopatra regal-dress'd
With the aspic at her breast;
Dancing music, music sad,
Both together, sane and mad;
Muses bright and muses ...

They tell us that the Muse is soon to fly hence,
Leaving the bowers of song that once were dear,
Her robes bequeathing to her sister, Science,
The groves of Pindus for the axe to clear.

Optics will claim the wandering eye of fancy,
Physics will grasp imagination's wings,
Plain fact exorcise fiction's necromancy,
The workshop hammer where the minstrel sings,

No more with laugher at Thalia's frolics
Our eyes shall twinkle till the tears run down,
But in her place the lecturer on hydraulics
Spout forth his watery science to the town.

No more our foolish passions and affections
The tragic Muse with mimic grief shall try,
But, nobler far, a course of vivisections
Teach what it costs a tortured brute to die.

The unearthed monad, long in burie...

One morn I looked across the way,
    And saw you fling your window wide
To welcome in the breath of May
    In breezes from the mountain-side,
And greet the sunlight's earliest ray
    With happy look and satisfied.

The pansies on your window-sill
    In terra cotta flowerpot,
Like royal gold and purple frill
    Upon the stony casement wrought,
Adorned your tasteful domicile
    And claimed your time and care and thought.

In cherry trees the robins sang
    Their sweetest carol to your ear,
And shouts of merry children rang
    Out on the dewy atmosphere,
But to my heart there came a pang
    That my salute you did not hear.

I envied then the favored breeze
    That dallied with your flowing hair,
Begrudged the songsters...

When our bosoms were lightest,
And day-dreams were brightest,
The gay vision melted away;
By sorrow 'twas shaded,
Too quickly it faded;
How transient its halcyon sway!

From my heart would you sever,
(Harsh fate!) and forever,
The friends who to life gave a charm,
What oblivion effaces
Fond mem'ry retraces,
And pictures each well-beloved form.

Some accent well known,
Some melodious tone,
Through my bosom like witchery shed,
Shall awake the sad sigh,
To the hours gone by,
And the friends, like a fairy dream, fled.

Long remembrance shall treasure
Those moments of pleasure,
When time flew unheeded away;
Joy's light skiff was near us,
Hope ventured to steer us,
And brighten our path with her ray.

We sa...

Oh, come with me to the Happy Isles
In the golden haze off yonder,
Where the song of the sun-kissed breeze beguiles,
And the ocean loves to wander.

Fragrant the vines that mantle those hills,
Proudly the fig rejoices;
Merrily dance the virgin rills,
Blending their myriad voices.

Our herds shall fear no evil there,
But peacefully feed and rest them;
Neither shall serpent nor prowling bear
Ever come there to molest them.

Neither shall Eurus, wanton bold,
Nor feverish drouth distress us,
But he that compasseth heat and cold
Shall temper them both to bless us.

There no vandal foot has trod,
And the pirate hosts that wander
Shall never profane the sacred sod
Of those beautiful Isles out yonder.

Never a spell shall b...

Softly, softly, Niccolo Amati!
What can put such fancies in your head?
There, go dream of your blue-skied Cremona,
While I ponder something you have said.

Something in that last low lovely cadence
Piercing the green dusk alone and far,
Named a new room in the house of knowledge,
Waiting unfrequented, door ajar.

While you dream then, let me unmolested
Pass in childish wonder through that door,--
Breathless, touch and marvel at the beauties
Soon my wiser elders must explore.

Ah, my Niccolo, it's no great science
We shall ever conquer, you and I.
Yet, when you are nestled at my shoulder,
Others guess not half that we descry.

As all sight is but a finer hearing,
And all color but a finer sound,
Beauty, but the reach of lyric freed...

There are sounds of mirth in the night-air ringing,
    And lamps from every casement shown;
While voices blithe within are singing,
    That seem to say "Come," in every tone.
Ah! once how light, in Life's young season,
    My heart had leapt at that sweet lay;
Nor paused to ask of graybeard Reason
    Should I the syren call obey.

And, see--the lamps still livelier glitter,
    The syren lips more fondly sound;
No, seek, ye nymphs, some victim fitter
    To sink in your rosy bondage bound.
Shall a bard, whom not the world in arms
    Could bend to tyranny's rude control,
Thus quail at sight of woman's charms
    And yield to a smile his freeborn soul?

Thus sung the sage, while, slyly stealing,
    The nymphs their fetters around him cast,

Gay visions for thee 'neath hope's pencil have glowed,
Peace dwells in thy bosom, a guileless abode;
Thou hast seen the bright side of existence alone,
And believ'st every spirit as pure as thine own.
May'st thou never awake from these rapturous dreams,
To find that the world is not fair as it seems,
To feel that the few thou hast loved have deceived,
Have forsaken the heart that confided, believed,
And left it as leafless, as bloomless, and waste
As the rose-tree that's stript by the merciless blast.

When the warm sky of childhood was beaming for me,
My days were all joyous, my heart was all glee;
Affection's best ties round my bosom were spun;
No cloud dimmed the lustre of life's morning sun.
If I watched o'er my favorite rose-bud's decay,
And mourned that ...

My garden roses long ago
Have perished from the leaf-strewn walks;
Their pale, fair sisters smile no more
Upon the sweet-brier stalks.

Gone with the flower-time of my life,
Spring's violets, summer's blooming pride,
And Nature's winter and my own
Stand, flowerless, side by side.

So might I yesterday have sung;
To-day, in bleak December's noon,
Come sweetest fragrance, shapes, and hues,
The rosy wealth of June!

Bless the young bands that culled the gift,
And bless the hearts that prompted it;
If undeserved it comes, at least
It seems not all unfit.

Of old my Quaker ancestors
Had gifts of forty stripes save one;
To-day as many roses crown
The gray head of their son.

And with them, to my fancy's eye,
The fres...

    There lies the trail to Sunnydale,
    Amid the lure of laughter.
    Oh, how can we unhappy be
    Beneath its leafy rafter!
    Each perfect hour is like a flower,
    Each day is like a posy.
    How can you say the skies are grey?
    You're wrong, my friend, they're rosy.

    With right good will let's climb the hill,
    And leave behind all sorrow.
    Oh, we'll be gay! a bright to-day
    Will make a bright to-morrow.
    Oh, we'll be strong! the way is long
    That never has a turning;
    The hill is high, but there's the sky,
    And how the West is burning!

    And if through chance of circumstance
    We have to go bare-foot, sir,
    We'll not repine - a friend of mine
    Has got no feet to boot, sir.
    Thi...