LINES WRITTEN ON A STARRY NIGHT.
YE distant, beautiful, and glowing stars,
That thus have twinkled 'neath the wings of night
So many countless years, all radiant still,
But silent as the grave!-How many hearts,
Yearning, like mine, to know your holy birth,
Have questioned you in vain! ye shine, and shine,
But answer not a word. Why is it thus?
Why are your vast circumferences lessened
By intervening cold and lifeless space?
In the wide ocean's waves that roll between,
The music of your motions too is lost;
Or if some meditative holy ear
Catch the sweet cadence flowing from above,
It is so soft, so faint, so exquisite,
It rather vibrates through the listening soul
Than trembles on the ear! 'Tis heavenly sweet
To see you gem the spacious firmament,
Like fiery brilliants set in ebony!
To gaze upon you, hung like beacons out
Upon the margin of another world,
Inviting us on high, is ecstasy!
But yet ye are so distant, and your
And bright immenseness so diminutived,
That a light sparrow's wing, nay, a frail leaf,
While trembling to the passing breath of night,
If interposed, can shut your brightness out,
Eclipse you for a moment from our eyes!
A leaf eclipse the world!
Even in our world itself: the veriest trash,
The hidden mischief of the secret earth,
Ancestry, title, blood, if hurled between
The gem of genius forming in the mine
And the sun's fostering ray, will intercept
The glorious, bright, and necessary fire,
And let the jewel perish in the womb
Of grand prolific Nature. But there are
Whose quiet beauty o'er my soul through distant years will come, Yet what but as the dead, to thee, shall I be then, my home?
Not as the dead!--no, not the dead! we speak of them—we keep
Their names, like light that must not fade, within our bosoms deep;
We hallow even the lyre they touched, we love the lay they sung, We pass with softer steps the place they filled our band among! But I depart, like sound, like dew, like aught that leaves on earth No trace of sorrow or delight, no memory of its birth!
I go!-the echo of the rock a thousand songs may swell, When mine is a forgotten voice.-Woods, mountains, home, farewell!
And farewell, mother! I have borne in lonely silence long,
But now the current of my soul grows passionate and strong;
And I will speak! though but the wind that wanders through the
sky,
And but the dark deep-rustling pines, and rolling streams reply.
Yes! I will speak! within my breast whate'er hath seemed to be,
There lay a hidden fount of love, that would have gushed for
thee!
Brightly it would have gushed, but thou-my mother! thou hast thrown
Back on the forests and the wilds what should have been thine
LINES WRITTEN ON A STARRY NIGHT.
YE distant, beautiful, and glowing stars,
That thus have twinkled 'neath the wings of night
So many countless years, all radiant still,
But silent as the grave!-How many hearts,
Yearning, like mine, to know your holy birth,
Have questioned you in vain! ye shine, and shine,
But answer not a word. Why is it thus?
Why are your vast circumferences lessened
By intervening cold and lifeless space?
In the wide ocean's waves that roll between,
The music of your motions too is lost;
Or if some meditative holy ear
Catch the sweet cadence flowing from above,
It is so soft, so faint, so exquisite,
It rather vibrates through the listening soul
Than trembles on the ear! 'Tis heavenly sweet
To see you gem the spacious firmament,
Like fiery brilliants set in ebony!
To gaze upon you, hung like beacons out
Upon the margin of another world,
Inviting us on high, is ecstasy!
But yet ye are so distant, and your round
And bright immenseness so diminutived,
That a light sparrow's wing, nay, a frail leaf,
While trembling to the passing breath of night,
If interposed, can shut your brightness out,
Eclipse you for a moment from our eyes!
A leaf eclipse the world! But oh! 't is thus
Even in our world itself: the veriest trash,
The hidden mischief of the secret earth,
Ancestry, title, blood, if hurled between
The gem of genius forming in the mine
And the sun's fostering ray, will intercept
The glorious, bright, and necessary fire,
And let the jewel perish in the womb
Of grand prolific Nature. But there are
Spirits of fire, that will shine out at last,
And blaze, and kindle others. These delight
In the lone musing hour to roam the earth;
To listen to the music of the trees;
Or if perchance the nightingale be near,
Pouring her sweet and solitary song,
They love to hear her lay. With such as these
"T is sweet to hold communion. Though the world
And fates of life forbid a closer tie,
Yet we can gaze upon the selfsame stars
As Byron in his Grecian skiff was wont
To view at midnight, or which livelier Moore
Translates into his soft and glowing song.
Nay, more those very stars in elder time,
Sparkling with purer light in the clear sky
Of Greece, perhaps were those that Homer saw,
And deemed so beautiful, that even the gods
Might dwell in them with pride. O holy Night!
If thou canst wake so many luminous dreams,
Call up such recollections; bring the past,
The present, and the future, into one
Immortal feeling; from thine influence
Let me draw inspiration; let me mount
Thy mystic atmosphere; and let the shapes
Of heroes, gods, and poets, in the clouds
Meet my impassioned gaze! My soul is dark,
And wild, and wayward; and the silver moon
Shooting her rays upon the misty deep,
Or sleeping on the frowning battlement
Of some time-stricken solitary tower
That rises in the desert, seems more bright,
And grand, and glorious, than the glaring sun
Shining upon the open
haunts of men.
How beautiful this night! the balmiest sigh
Which vernal zephyrs breathe in Evening's ear,
Were discord to the speaking quietude
That wraps this moveless scene.
Studded with stars unutterably bright,
Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur rolls,
Seems like a canopy which Love has spread
Above the sleeping world. Yon gentle hills,
Robed in a garment of untrodden snow;
Yon darksome rocks, whence icicles depend,
So stainless, that their white and glittering spires
Tinge not the moon's pure beam; yon castled steep,
Whose banner hangeth o'er the time-worn tower
So idly, that 'rapt fancy deemeth it
A metaphor of peace;—all form a scene
Where musing Solitude might love to lift
Her soul above this sphere of earthliness;
Where silence undisturbed might watch alone,
So cold, so bright, so still!
The orb of day,
In southern climes, o'er ocean's waveless field
Sinks sweetly smiling: not the faintest breath
Steals o'er the unruffled deep; the clouds of eve
Reflect unmoved the lingering beam of day;
And Vesper's image on the western main
Is beautifully still. To-morrow comes:
Cloud upon cloud, in dark and deepening mass,
Roll o'er the blackened waters; the deep roar
Of distant thunder mutters awfully;
Tempest unfolds its pinions o'er the gloom
That shrouds the boiling surge; the pitiless fiend,
With all his winds and lightnings, tracks his prey;
The torn deep yawns — the vessel finds a grave
Beneath its jagged gulf.
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