And joys of heaven would thrill thy heart, To bid one bosom-grief depart,
One tear, one sorrow cease!
Then, oh! may Heaven, that loves to bless,
Bestow the power to cheer distress;
Make thee its minister below,
To light the cloudy path of woe;
To visit the deserted cell,
Where indigence is doom'd to dwell;
To raise, when drooping to the earth,
The blossoms of neglected worth;
And round, with liberal hand, dispense
The sunshine of beneficence!
But ah! if Fate should still deny
Delights like these, too rich and high;
If grief and pain thy steps assail,
In life's remote and wintry vale:
Then as the wild Æolian lyre,
Complains with soft entrancing number,
When the lone storm awakes the wire,
And bids enchantment cease to slumber;
So filial love, with soothing voice,
E'en then shall teach thee to rejoice;
E'en then shall sweeter, milder sound,
When sorrow's tempest raves around;
While dark misfortune's gales destroy,
The frail mimosa-buds of hope and joy!
Come to me, O my Mother! come to me,
Thine own son slowly dying far away!
Through the moist ways of the wide ocean, blown
By great invisible winds, come stately ships
To this calm bay for quiet anchorage;
They come, they rest awhile, they go away,
But, O my Mother, never comest thou!
The snow is round thy dwelling, the white snow,
That cold soft revelation pure as light,
And the pine-spire is mystically fringed,
Laced with incrusted silver. Here - ah me!
The winter is decrepit, underborn,
A leper with no power but his disease.
Why am I from thee, Mother, far from thee?
Far from the frost enchantment, and the woods
Jewelled from bough to bough? O home, my home!
O river in the valley of my home,
With mazy-winding motion intricate,
Twisting thy deathless music underneath
The polished ice-work,- must I nevermore
Behold thee with familiar eyes, and watch
Thy beauty changing with the changeful day,
Thy beauty constant to the constant change?
HYMN OF A VIRGIN OF DELPHI AT THE TOMB OF HER MOTHER
Oh! lost! forever lost! no more
Shall Vesper light our dewy way
Along the rocks of Crissa's shore,
To hymn the fading fires of day!
No more to Tempe's distant vale
In holy musings shall we roam,
Through summer's glow and winter's gale,
To bear the mystic chaplets home!
'Twas then my soul's expanding zeal,
By Nature warmed and led by thee,
In every breeze was taught to feel
The breathings of a deity!
Guide of my heart! to memory true,
Thy looks, thy words, are still my own
I see thee raising from the dew
Some laurel, by the wind o'erthrown,
And hear thee say, "This humble bough
Was planted for a doom divine,
And, though it weep in languor now,
Shall flourish on the Delphic shrine!
Thus in the vale of earthly sense,
Though sunk awhile the spirit lies,
A viewless hand shall cull it thence,
To bloom immortal in the skies!"
Thy words had such a melting flow,
And spoke of truth so sweetly well,
They dropped like heaven's serenest snow,
And all was brightness where they fell!
Fond soother of my infant tear!
Fond sharer of my infant joy!
Is not thy shade still lingering here?
Am I not still thy soul's employ?
And oh! as oft at close of day,
When meeting on the sacred mount,
Our nymphs awaked the choral lay,
And danced around Cassotis' fount:
As then, 'twas all thy wish and care,
That mine should be the simplest mien,
My lyre and voice the sweetest there,
My foot the lightest o'er the green:
So still, each little grace to mold,
Around my form thine eyes are shed,
Arranging every snowy fold,
And guiding every mazy tread!
And when I lead the hymning choir,
Thy spirit still, unseen and free,
Hovers between my lips and lyre,
And weds them into harmony!
Flow, Plistus, flow, thy murmuring wave
Shall never drop its silvery tear
Upon so pure, so blest a grave,
To memory so divinely dear!
ROCK ME TO SLEEP *
BY ELIZABETH AKERS
Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight, Make me a child again just for to-night!
Mother come back from the echoless shore,
Take me again to your heart as of yore;
Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care,
Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair;
Over my slumbers your loving watch keep; -
Rock me to sleep, mother,-rock me to sleep!
Backward, flow backward, O tide of the years!
I am so weary of toil and of tears,-
Toil without recompense, tears all in vain,—
Take them, and give me my childhood again!
I have grown weary of dust and decay,—
Weary of flinging my soul-wealth away;
Weary of sowing for others to reap;
Rock me to sleep, mother, rock me to sleep!
Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrue,
Mother, O mother, my heart calls for you!
Many a summer the grass has grown green,
Blossomed and faded, our faces between:
Yet, with strong yearning and passionate pain
Long I to-night for your presence again.
Come from the silence so long and so deep; -
Rock me to sleep, mother, rock me to sleep!
Over my heart, in the days that are flown,
No love like mother-love ever has shone;
No other worship abides and endures,-
Faithful, unselfish, and patient like yours:
None like a mother can charm away pain
From the sick soul and world-weary brain.
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