George W. Sands

George W. Sands was an African American poet who contributed to the anthology 'The Forest City by Night' (1853). His biography is not well-documented, and little is known about his life outside of his work. Despite the limited information, his contribution to African American literature during the 19th century remains significant as part of the cultural and artistic movement of the time.

English

George W. Sands

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A Legend Of The Hartz.

Many ages ago, near the high Hartz, there dwelt
A rude race of blood-loving giants, who felt
No joy but the fierce one which Carnage bestows,
When her foul lips are clogged with the blood of her foes.

And fiercer and bolder than all of the rest
Was Bohdo,[1] their chieftain; - 'twas strange that a breast,
Which nothing like kindness or pity might move,
Should glow with the warmth and the rapture of love.

Yet he loved, and the pale mountain-monarch's fair child
Was the maid of his heart; but tho' burning and wild
Was the love that he bore her, it won no return,
And the flame that consumed him was answered with scorn.

Now the lady is gone with her steed to the plain, -
Save the falcon and hound there is none in her train;
She needs none to guide, or to g...

George W. Sands

Acle At The Grave Of Nero.

It is a circumstance connected with the history of Nero, that every spring and summer, for many years after his death, fresh and beautiful flowers were nightly scattered upon his grave by some unknown hand.

Tradition relates that it was done by a young maiden of Corinth, named Acle, whom Nero had brought to Rome from her native city, whither he had gone in the disguise of an artist, to contend in the Nemean, Isthinian, and Floral games, celebrated there; and whence he returned conqueror in the Palaestra, the chariot race, and the song; bearing with him, like Jason of old, a second Medea, divine in form and feature as the first, and who like her had left father, friends, and country, to follow a stranger.

Even the worse than savage barbarity of this sanguinary tyrant, had not cut him off from all human affection; and ...

George W. Sands

After Witnessing A Death-Scene.

    Press close your lips,
And bow your heads to earth, for Death is here!
Mark ye not how across that eye so clear,
    Steals his eclipse?

    A moment more,
And the quick throbbings of her heart shall cease,
Her pain-wrung spirit will obtain release,
    And all be o'er!

    Hush! Seal ye up
Your gushing tears, for Mercy's hand hath shaken
Her earth-bonds off, and from her lip hath taken
    Grief's bitter cup.

    Ye know the dead
Are they who rest secure from care and strife, -
That they who walk the thorny way of life,
    Have tears to shed.

    Ye know her pray'r,
Was for the quiet of the tomb's deep rest, -
Love's sepulchre lay cold within her breast,
    Could peace dwell there?

    A tale soon told,<...

George W. Sands

Impromptu,

On The Reception Of A Letter.

I would love to have thee near me,
    But when I think how drear
Is each hope that used to cheer me,
    I cease to wish thee here.

I know that thou, wouldst not shrink from
    The storms that burst on me,
But the bitter chalice I drink from,
    I will not pass to thee.

I would share the world with thee, were it
    With all its pleasures mine,
But the sorrows which I inherit,
    I never will make thine!

George W. Sands

Lines Written In A Young Lady's Album

'Tis not in youth, when life is new, when but to live is sweet,
When Pleasure strews her starlike flow'rs beneath our careless feet,
When Hope, that has not been deferred, first waves its golden wings,
And crowds the distant future with a thousand lovely things; -

When if a transient grief o'ershades the spirit for a while,
The momentary tear that falls is followed by a smile;
Or if a pensive mood, at times, across the bosom steals,
It scarcely sighs, so gentle is the pensiveness it feels

It is not then the, restless soul will seek for one with whom
To share whatever lot it bears, its gladness or its gloom, -
Some trusting, tried, and gentle heart, some true and faithful breast,
Whereon its pinions it may fold, and claim a place of rest.

But oh! when comes the i...

George W. Sands

Love And Fancy.

            "Whenever, amid bow'rs of myrtle,
                Love, summer-tressed and vernal-eyed,
            At morn or eve is seen to wander,
                A dark-haired girl is at his side."
            De La Hogue.

One morn, just as day in the far east was breaking,
    Young Love, who all night had been roving about,
A charming siesta was quietly taking,
    His strength, by his rambles, completely worn out.

Round his brow a wreath, woven of every flower
    That springs from the hillside, or valley, was bound;
In his hand was a rose he had stol'n from some bower,
    While his bow and his quiver lay near on the ground.

Wild Fancy just came from her kingdom of dreams,
    The breath of the opening day to enjoy,
And to catch the warm kiss ...

George W. Sands

Mazelli - Canto II.

I.

He stood where the mountain moss outspread
    Its smoothness beneath his dusky foot;
The chestnut boughs above his head,
    Hung motionless and mute.
There came not a voice from the wooded hill,
    Nor a sound from the shadowy glen,
Save the plaintive song of the whip-poor-will,[2]
    And the waterfall's dash, and now and then,
        The night-bird's mournful cry.
Deep silence hung round him; the misty light
Of the young moon silvered the brow of Night,
    Whose quiet spirit had flung her spell
O'er the valley's depth, and the mountain's height,
    And breathed on the air, till its gentle swell
Arose on the ear like some loved one's call;
And the wide blue sky spread over all
        Its starry canopy.
And he seemed as the spirit of ...

George W. Sands

Mazelli - Canto III.

I.

With plumes to which the dewdrops cling,
Wide waves the morn her golden wing;
With countless variegated beams
The empurpled orient glows and gleams;
A gorgeous mass of crimson clouds
The mountain's soaring summit shrouds;
Along the wave the blue mist creeps,
    The towering forest trees are stirred
By the low wind that o'er them sweeps,
    And with the matin song of bird,
    The hum of early bee is heard,
Hailing with his shrill, tiny horn,
The coming of the bright-eyed morn;
And, with the day-beam's earliest dawn,
    Her couch the fair Mazelli quits,
And gaily, fleetly as a fawn,
    Along the wildwood paths she flits,
Hieing from leafy bower to bower,
Culling from each its bud and flower,
Of brightest hue and sweetest breath,...

George W. Sands

The Deserted.

"Come, sit thee by my side once more,
    'Tis long since thus we' met;
And though our dream of love is o'er,
    Its sweetness lingers yet.
Its transient day has long been past,
    Its flame has ceased to burn, -
But Memory holds its spirit fast,
    Safe in her sacred urn.

"I will not chide thy wanderings,
    Nor ask why thou couldst flee
A heart whose deep affection's springs
    Poured forth such love for thee!
We may not curb the restless mind,
    Nor teach the wayward heart
To love against its will, nor bind
    It with the chains of art.

"I would but tell thee how, in tears
    And bitterness, my soul
Has yearned with dreams, through long, long, years,
    Which it could not control.
And how the thought that clingeth t...

George W. Sands

The Lock Of Hair.

It is in sooth a lovely tress,
    Still curled in many a ring,
As glossy as the plumes that dress
    The raven's jetty wing.
And the broad and soul-illumined brow,
    Above whose arch it grew,
Was like the stainless mountain snow,
    In its purity of hue.

I mind the time 'twas given to me,
    The night, the hour, the spot;
And the eye that pleaded silently,
    "Forget the giver not."
Oh! myriads of stars, on high,
    Were smiling sweetly fair,
But none was lovely as the eye
    That shone beside me there!

Above our heads an ancient oak
    Its strong, wide arms held out,
And from its roots a fountain broke,
    With a tiny laughing shout;
And the fairy people of the wild
    Were bending to their rest,
As trusti...

George W. Sands

The Misanthrope Reclaimed - ACT II.

The verge of Creation. Enter Werner and Spirit.

Werner.

We have outtravelled light and sound:
The harmonies that pealed around us, as
Through yon array of dim and distant worlds
We winged our flight, have wholly died away,
Or come to us so faintly echoed, that
Our ears must watch and wait to catch them.
Those stars are now like watch-fires, which though seen
Blazing afar, send not their light to make
The path of the benighted wanderer
More plain and cheerful.
Before us stretches one vast field of gloom,
So dense as to appear impenetrable: -
Darkness, that has a body and a form,
Both palpable to touch and sight, across
Our path a barrier rears that seems to bar
Our farther progress. If there be, beyond
This wall of blackness, aught of myst...

George W. Sands

The Misanthrope Reclaimed - ACT III.

Scene I. Near the place of the damned. Enter Werner and Spirit.

Werner.

    What piercing, stunning sounds assail my ear!
Wild shrieks and wrathful curses, groans and prayers,
A chaos of all cries! making the space
Through which they penetrate to flutter like
The heart of a trapped hare, - are revelling round us.
    Unlike the gloomy realm we just have quitted,
Silent and solemn, all is restless here,
All wears the ashy hue of agony.
Above us bends a black and starless vault,
Which ever echoes back the fearful voices
That rise from the abodes of wo beneath.
Around us grim-browed desolation broods,
While, far below, a sea of pale gray clouds,
Like to an ocean tempest beaten, boils.
Whither shall we direct our journey now?

Spirit.

George W. Sands

The Misanthrope Reclaimed - ACT IV.

Scene I. A peak of the Alps. Werner alone. Time, morning.

Werner.

    How gloriously beautiful is earth!
In these her quiet, unfrequented haunts,
To which, except the timid chamois' foot,
Or venturous hunter's, or the eagle's wing,
Naught from beneath ascends. As yet the sun
But darts his earliest rays of golden light
Upon the summits of the tallest peaks,
Which robed in clouds and capped with glittering ice,
Soar proudly up, and beam and blaze aloft,
As if they would claim kindred with the stars!
And they may claim such kindred, for there is
Within, around, and over them, the same
Supreme, eternal, all-creating spirit
Which glows and burns in every beaming orb
That circles in immeasurable space!
    Far as the eye can trace the mountain's cre...

George W. Sands

The Old Man And The Boy.

"Glenara, Glenara, now read me my dream."
Campbell.

Father, I have dreamed a dream,
    When the rosy morning hour
Poured its light on field and stream,
    Kindling nature with its pow'r; -

O'er the meadow's dewy breast,
    I had chased a butterfly,
Tempted by its gaudy vest,
    Still my vain pursuit to ply, -

Till my limbs were weary grown,
    With the distance I had strayed,
Then to rest I laid me down,
    Where a beech tree cast its shade,

Soon a heaviness came o'er me,
    And a deep sleep sealed my eyes;
And a vision past before me,
    Full of changing phantasies.

First I stood beside a bower,
    Green as summer bow'r could be;
Vine and fruit, and leaf and flower,
    Mixed to weave its canopy....

George W. Sands

The Venetian Girl's Evening Song.

Unmoor the skiff, - unmoor the skiff, -
    The night wind's sigh is on the air,
And o'er the highest Alpine cliff,
    The pale moon rises, broad and clear.
The murmuring waves are tranquil now,
    And on their breast each twinkling star
With which Night gems her dusky brow,
    Flings its mild radiance from afar.

Put off upon the deep blue sea,
    And leave the banquet and the ball;
For solitude, when shared with thee,
    Is dearer than the carnival.
And in my heart are thoughts of love,
    Such thoughts as lips should only breathe,
When the bright stars keep watch above,
    And the calm waters sleep beneath!

The tale I have for thee, perchance,
    May to thine eye anew impart
The long-lost gladness of its glance,
    And soo...

George W. Sands

These lines are inscribed to the memory of John Q. Carlin, killed at Buena Vista.

Warrior of the youthful brow,
    Eager heart and eagle eye!
Pants thy soul for battle now?
    Burns thy glance with victory?
Dost thou dream of conflicts done,
Perils past and trophies won?
And a nation's grateful praise
Given to thine after days?

Bloodless is thy cheek, and cold
    As the clay upon it prest;
And in many a slimy fold,
    Winds the grave-worm round thy breast.
Thou wilt join the fight no more, -
Glory's dream with thee is o'er, -
And alike are now to thee
Greatness and obscurity.

But an ever sunny sky,
    O'er thy place of rest is bending;
And above thy grave, and nigh,
    Flowers ever bright are blending.
O'er thy dreamless, calm repose,
Balmily the south wind blows, -
With the green turf on thy ...

George W. Sands

To A Lady.

Suggested By Hearing Her Voice During Services At Church.

At night, in visions, when my soul drew near
    The shadowy confines of the spirit land,
Wild, wondrous notes of song have met my ear,
    Wrung from their harps by many a seraph's hand;
And forms of light, too, more divinely fair
    Than Mercy's messenger to hearts that mourn,
On wings that made sweet music in the air,
    Have round me, in those hours of bliss, been borne,
And, filled with joy unutterable, I
Have deemed myself a born child of the sky.

And often, too, at sunset's magic hour,
    When musing by some solitary stream,
While thought awoke in its resistless pow'r,
    And restless Fancy wove her brightest dream:
Mysterious tongues, that were not of the earth,
    Have whispere...

George W. Sands

To Isabel

A Beautiful Little Girl.

Fair as some sea-child, in her coral bower,
    Decked with the rare, rich treasures of the deep;
Mild as the spirit of the dream whose power
    Bears back the infant's soul to heaven, in sleep
Brightens the hues of summer's first-born flower
    Pure as the tears repentant mourners weep
O'er deeds to which the siren, Sin, beguiled, -
Art thou, sweet, smiling, bright-eyed cherub child.

Thy presence is a spell of holiness,
    From which unhallowed thoughts shrink blushing back, -
Thy smile is a warm light that shines to bless,
    As beams the beacon o'er the wanderer's track, -
Thy voice is music, at whose sounds Distress
    Unbinds her writhing victim from the rack
Of misery, and charmed by what she hears,
Forgets her w...

George W. Sands

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