Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

Let your light sisters play;
Ye, follow the bier

Of the dead cold year,

And make her grave green with tear on tear.

SHELLEY.

Y

THE AMULET.

OUR picture smiles as first it smiled,
The ring you gave is still the same,
Your letter tells, O changing child,
No tidings since it came.

Give me an amulet that keeps
Intelligence with you,

Red when you love, and rosier red,

And when you love not, pale and blue.

Alas, that neither bonds nor vows

Can certify possession;

Torments me still the fear that love

Died in its last expression.

EMERSON.

THE CHARACTER OF A HAPPY LIFE.

OW happy is he born and taught,

That serveth not another's will;
Whose armour is his honest thought,
And simple truth his utmost skill!

Whose passions not his masters are;
Whose soul is still prepared for death;
Untied unto the worldly care

Of publick fame or private breath :

Who envies none that chance doth raise,
Or vice; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise;
Nor rules of state, but rules of good :

Who hath his life from humours freed;
Whose conscience is his strong retreat;
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make accusers great:

Who late and early doth God pray
More of his grace than gifts to lend;
And entertains the harmless day

With a well-chosen book or friend :

This man is freed from servile bands
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall;
Lord of himself, though not of lands
And having nothing, yet hath all.

;

SIR HENRY WOTTON.

A

[WANT OF SLEEP.]

FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by,

One after one; the sound of rain, and trees Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas, Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky;

I thought of all by turns, and yet I lie

Sleepless! and soon the small birds' melodies Must hear, first utter'd from my orchard trees; And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry.

Even thus last night, and two nights more, I lay,
And could not win thee, Sleep! by any stealth:
So do not let me wear to-night away:

Without Thee what is all the morning's wealth?
Come, blessed barrier between day and day,
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!
WORDSWORTH.

ABOU BEN ADHEM AND THE ANGEL.

(D'HERBELOT-BIBLIOTHEQUE ORIENTALE,
1781, TOM. I. p. 161.)

A

BOU Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of

peace,

And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold :-
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou ?"-The vision raised its

head,

And with a look made of all sweet accord, Answer'd, "The names of those who love the

Lord."

"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so," Replied the Angel. Abou spoke more low,

But cheerly still; and said, "I pray

thee then, Write me as one that loves his fellow-men."

The angel wrote, and vanish'd. The next night It came again with a great wakening light,

And show'd the names whom love of God had

bless'd,

And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

LEIGH HUNT.

LUCY ASHTON'S SONG.

66

[FROM THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR."]

L

OOK not thou on beauty's charming;
Sit thou still when kings are arming;
Taste not when the wine cup glistens ;
Speak not when the people listens ;
Stop thine ear against the singer;
From the red gold keep thy finger;
Vacant heart and hand and eye,
Easy live and quiet die.

SCOTT.

I

A DREAM.

HEARD the dogs howl in the moonlight night,

And I went to the window to see the sight;

All the dead that ever I knew

Going one by one and two by two.

On they pass'd, and on they pass'd;
Townsfellows all from first to last;

Born in the moonlight of the lane,
And quench'd in the heavy shadow again.

Schoolmates, marching as when we play'd
At soldiers once-but now more staid;
Those were the strangest sight to me
Who were drown'd, I knew, in the awful sea.

Straight and handsome folk; bent and weak too;
And some that I loved, and gasp'd to speak to;
Some but a day in their churchyard bed;
And some that I had not known were dead.

A long, long crowd-where each seem'd lonely.
And yet of them all there was one, one only,
That raised a head, or look'd my way;
And she seem'd to linger, but might not stay.

How long since I saw that fair pale face!
Ah, mother dear, might I only place
My head on thy breast, a moment to rest,
While thy hand on my tearful cheek were prest!

On, on, a moving bridge they made

Across the moon-stream, from shade to shade: Young and old, women and men;

Many long-forgot, but remember'd then.

And first there came a bitter laughter;
And a sound of tears a moment after;
And then a music so lofty and gay,
That every morning, day by day,
I strive to recal it if I may.

W. ALLINGHAM,

C

« AnteriorContinuar »