Wherefore hast thou left me now
Many a day and night?
Many a weary night and day
'Tis since thou art fled away.
2. How shall ever one like me
Win thee back again?
With the joyous and the free,
Thou wilt scoff at pain.
Spirit false thou hast forgot
All but those who need thee not.

3. As a lizard with the shade
Of a trembling leaf,

Thou with sorrow art dismayed;
Even the sighs of grief

Reproach thee that thou art not near,
And reproach thou wilt not hear.

4. Let me set my mournful ditty
To a merry measure;-
Thou wilt never come for pity,

Thou wilt come for pleasure;

Pity then will cut away

Those cruel wings, and thou wilt stay.

5. I love all that thou lovest,

Spirit of Delight!

The fresh earth in new leaves dressed,
And the starry night,

Autumn evening, and the morn

When the golden mists are born.

6. I love snow, and all the forms

Of the radiant frost;

I love waves and winds and storms,

Everything almost

Which is Nature's, and may be

Untainted by man's misery.

7. I love tranquil solitude,

And such society

As is quiet, wise, and good.
Between thee and me

What difference? But thou dost possess
The things I seek, not love them less.

8. I love Love, though he has wings,

And like light can flee;

But above all other things,
Spirit, I love thee-

Thou art love and life! Oh come!
Make once more my heart thy home!

LINES

WRITTEN ON HEARING THE NEWS OF THE DEATH OF NAPOLEON.

I. WHAT! alive and so bold, O Earth?
Art thou not over-bold?

What! leapest thou forth as of old
In the light of thy morning mirth,
The last of the flock of the starry fold?
Ha! leapest thou forth as of old?
Are not the limbs still when the ghost is fled,
And canst thou move, Napoleon being dead?
2. How! is not thy quick heart cold?

What spark is alive on thy hearth?
How! is not his death-knell knolled,
And livest thou still, Mother Earth?
Thou wert warming thy fingers old
O'er the embers covered and cold
Of that most fiery spirit, when it fled-
What, Mother, dost thou laugh now he is dead?

3.

"Who has known me of old," replied Earth,
"Or who has my story told?

It is thou who art over-bold."

And the lightning of scorn laughed forth
As she sung, "To my bosom I fold

All my sons when their knell is knolled;

And so with living motion all are fed,

And the quick spring like weeds out of the dead.

4.

"Still alive and still bold," shouted Earth,
"I grow bolder and still more bold.
The dead fill me ten thousand fold
Fuller of speed and splendour and mirth.
I was cloudy and sullen and cold,
Like a frozen chaos uprolled,

Till by the spirit of the mighty dead

My heart grew warm: I feed on whom I fed.

5. "Ay, alive and still bold," muttered Earth,
"Napoleon's fierce spirit rolled

In terror and blood and gold,

A torrent of ruin to death from his birth.

Leave the millions who follow to mould
The metal before it be cold;

And weave into his shame, which, like the dead
Shrouds me, the hopes that from his glory fled."

MUTABILITY.

TIE flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow dies:

All that we wish to stay

Tempts and then flies.
What is this world's delight?
Lightning that mocks the night,
Brief even as bright.

Virtue how frail it is!
Friendship how rare!

Love how it sells poor bliss
For proud despair!

But we, though soon they fall,
Survive their joy, and all
Which ours we call

Whilst skies are blue and bright,
Whilst flowers are gay,

Whilst eyes that change ere night
Make glad the day,

Whilst yet the calm hours creep,
Dream thou-and from thy sleep
Then wake to weep.

SONNET.

POLITICAL GREATNESS.

NOR happiness, nor majesty, nor fame,

Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in arms or arts, Shepherd those herds whom tyranny makes tame :— Verse echoes not one beating of their hearts; History is but the shadow of their shame ;

Art veils her glass, or from the pageant starts,
As to oblivion their blind millions fleet,

Staining that heaven with obscene imagery
Of their own likeness. What are numbers knit
By force or custom? Man who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself; in it
Must be supreme, establishing his throne

On vanquished will, quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears, being himself alone.

LINES.

IF I walk in Autumn's even
While the dead leaves pass,

Itself indifferent.

But, not to speak of love, pity alone Can break a spirit already more than bent. The miserable one

Turns the mind's poison into food,—

Its medicine is tears,-its evil good.

3. Therefore, if now I see you seldomer,

Dear friends, dear friend! know that I only fly
Your looks because they stir

Griefs that should sleep, and hopes that cannot die : The very comfort that they minister

I scarce can bear; yet I,

So deeply is the arrow gone,

Should quickly perish if it were withdrawn.
4. When I return to my cold home, you ask
Why I am not as I have lately been?
You spoil me for the task

Of acting a forced part in life's dull scene,-
Of wearing on my brow the idle mask

Of author, great or mean,

In the world's carnival.

I sought

Peace thus, and but in you I found it not.

5. Full half an hour, to-day, I tried my lot

With various flowers, and every one still said,
"She loves me, loves me not."

And if this meant a vision long since fled-
If it meant fortune, fame, or peace of thought—
If it meant-(but I dread

To speak what you may know too well)—

Still there was truth in the sad oracle.

6. The crane o'er seas and forests seeks her home;
No bird so wild but has its quiet nest

When it no more would roam;
The sleepless billows on the ocean's breast
Break like a bursting heart, and die in foam,
And thus at length find rest:
Doubtless there is a place of peace

Where my weak heart and all its throbs will cease.

7. I asked her yesterday if she believed

That I had resolution. One who had

Would ne'er have thus relieved

His heart with words,-but what his judgment bad
Would do, and leave the scorner unrelieved.-
These verses were too sad

To send to you, but that I know,

Happy yourself, you feel another's woe.

ΤΟ

ONE word is too often profaned
For me to profane it;

One feeling too falsely disdained
For thee to disdain it;

One hope is too like despair

For prudence to smother;
And pity from thee more dear
Than that from another.

I can give not what men call love :
But wilt thou accept not
The worship the heart lifts above,
And the Heavens reject not:
The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow,
The devotion to something afar

From the sphere of our sorrow?

ΤΟ

WHEN passion's trance is overpast
If tenderness and truth could last,
Or live whilst all wild feelings keep
Some mortal slumber, dark and deep,
I should not weep, I should not weep!

It were enough to feel, to see,
Thy soft eyes gazing tenderly,
And dream the rest-and burn, and be
The secret food of fires unseen-
Couldst thou but be as thou hast been.

After the slumber of the year

The woodland violets re-appear;

All things revive in field or grove,

And sky and sea, but two, which move

And form all others, life and love..

A BRIDAL SONG.

THE golden gates of Sleep unbar,

Where Strength and Beauty, met together, Kindle their image, like a star

In a sea of glassy weather.

Night, with all thy stars look down—

Darkness, weep thy holiest dew! Never smiled the inconstant moon

On a pair so true.