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A SERENADE.

(FROM THE SPANISH).

IF slumber, sweet Lisena!
Have stolen o'er thine eyes,
As night steals o'er the glory
Of spring's transparent skies;

Wake, in thy scorn and beauty,
And listen to the strain
That murmurs my devotion,

That mourns for thy disdain.

Here by the door at midnight,
I pass the dreary hour,
With plaintive sounds profaning
The silence of thy bower;

A tale of sorrow cherished

Too fondly to depart,

Of wrong from love the flatterer,

And from my own wild heart.

Twice, o'er this vale, the seasons

Have brought and borne away The January tempest,

The genial wind of May;

Yet still my plaint is uttered,

My tears and sighs are given To earth's unconscious waters, And wandering winds of heaven.

I saw from this fair region,
The smile of summer pass,
And myriad frost-stars glitter
Among the russet grass;

While winter seized the streamlets
That fled along the ground,
And fast in chains of crystal
The truant murmurers bound.

I saw that to the forest.

The nightingales had flown, And every sweet-voiced fountain Had hushed its silver tone.

The maniac winds, divorcing

The turtle from his mate, Raved through the leafy beeches, And left them desolate.

Now May, with life and music,
The blooming valley fills,
And rears her flowery arches

For all the little rills.

The minstrel bird of evening Comes back on joyous wings, And, like the harp's soft murmur, Is heard the gush of springs.

And deep within the forest
Are wedded turtles seen,

Their nuptial chambers seeking-
Their chambers close and green.

The rugged trees are mingling
Their flowery sprays in love;

The ivy climbs the laurel,

To clasp the boughs above.

They change- but thou, Lisena, Art cold while I complain :

Why to thy lover only

Should spring return in vain?

TO THE MEMORY OF WILLIAM LEGGETT.

THE earth may ring, from shore to shore,
With echoes of a glorious name,

But he, whose loss our tears deplore,
Has left behind him more than fame.

For when the death frost came to lie
On Leggett's warm and mighty heart,
And quenched his bold and friendly eye,
His spirit did not all depart.

The words of fire that from his pen
Were flung upon the lucid page,
Still move, still shake the hearts of men,
Amid a cold and coward age.

His love of truth, too warm, too strong
For Hope or Fear to chain or chill,

His hate of tyranny and wrong,

Burn in the breasts he kindled still.

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The latest of whose train goes softly out

In the red West. The green blade of the ground. Has risen, and herds have cropped it; the young

twig

Has spread its plaited tissues to the sun;

Flowers of the garden and the waste have blown
And withered; seeds have fallen upon the soil,
From bursting cells, and in their graves await
Their resurrection. Insects from the pools
Have filled the air awhile with humming wings,
That now are still forever; painted moths
Have wandered the blue sky, and died again;
The mother-bird hath broken, for her brood,

This poem and that entitled the Fountain, with one or two others in blank verse, were intended by the author as portions of a larger poem, in which they may hereafter take their place.

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