VIII.

ON A DOMESTIC CALAMITY.

Now is all love shut from me;-I am left,
Like the scathed pine upon the mountain's brow,
Withered and branchless.-The last verdant bough,
That, 'mid the blight, put forth its freshening hues,
Hath felt the lightning's wrath;-my all is reft,
And I must wend me through life's vale of woe
In solitude and tears :-well, be it so !-

Yet these sweet thoughts shall soothe me, and diffuse
A healing balm upon my suffering soul:-

That I have been most happy, though so brief

Were my young days of gladness-that my grief
Was not of mine own planting, but the sole

Endowment of misfortune ;-and that bliss

May bloom, from sorrow's seeds, in brighter realms

than this.

IX.

TO SUSPENSE.

ILL-BODING Fiend! How oft thy fiery breath
Hath stirred the storm of passion in my soul,
Until the waves of thought spurned all controul,
And swelled to a fierce Phlegethon !-Beneath
The wide expanse of eternal sky,

yon

What hath the power to rack the feeling heart

Like thy keen-torturing vengeance? Where the smart,
Can match the brain-bewildering agony
Thy presence doth create ?-My lot, through life,
Demon of dark uncertainty! hath been

To have sweet feelings maddened into strife
By thy bliss-blighting influence;-and each scene
Of beauty, shadowed by thy wing accursed!-
When shall I 'scape thy fangs? My heart-be still-
or burst!

STANZAS FOR MUSIC.

1.

MUSIC.

Yes, Music hath the key of memory,

And thoughts and visions buried deep and long,
Come at the summons of its sweetness nigh.

CROLY.

I.

MYSTERIOUS keeper of the key
That opes the gates of Memory,
Oft, in thy wildest, simplest strain,
We live o'er years of bliss again!

II.

The sun-bright hopes of early youth, Love-in its first deep hour of truth,And dreams of life's delightful morn, Are on thy seraph pinions borne !