That absent from my mind should be
The thought that loves and looks to thee!
Each happy hour that we have proved,
While love's delicious converse blended,
As 'neath the twilight star we roved,
Unconscious where our progress tended—
Still brings my mind a soft relief,
And bids it love the joys of grief!
What soothing recollections throng,
Presenting many a mournful token,
That heart's remembrance to prolong,
Which then was blest, and now is broken!
I cannot—Oh! hast thou forgot
Our early loves—this hallowed spot!
I almost think I see thee stand;
I almost dream I hear thee speaking;
I feel the pressure of thy hand;
Thy living glance in fondness seeking—
Here all apart—by all unseen—
Thy form upon my arm to lean!
Tho' beauty bless the landscape still,
Tho' woods surround, and waters lave it,
My heart feels not the vivid thrill,
Which long ago thy presence gave it;
Mirth, music, friendship, have no tone
Like that, which with thy voice hath flown!
And Memory only now remains,
To whisper things that once delighted:
Still—still I love to tread these plains,
To seek this sacred haunt benighted,
And feel a something, sadly sweet,
In resting on this mossy seat.
I.
Balm best and holiest;
Fallen is the lofty tree,
Low as the lowliest!
Rent is the eaglet's plume,
Towering victorious;
Read on the hero's tomb
The end of the glorious.
2.
It threatens no longer;
Snapt like its high compeer,
The willow is stronger.
See on its dinted edge
The last day-beam flashes,
If thine be the soul to stand
And number its gashes.
3.
In darkness enshrouded,
Ashes, yet scarcely cold,
Beneath it are crowded:
Thy feet o'er some noble heart
May stumble unheeding;
O'er thy familiar friend
Perchance may be treading.
4.
Sons of the morning!
Triumph, but seen and past,
Your proud brows adorning,
After such mortal toil
To slumber so soundly,
Can aught to the heart of man
Speak so profoundly?
June 1815. B.
A NIGHT SCENE.
Now flaming no more on the soft-heaving main,
The sun's parting splendour is shed;
Night's dark-rolling shades have enveloped the plain,
And the twilight's faint visions have fled.
No longer in Day's gaudy colouring glows
The landscape, in Nature's diversity gay:
The loud-lowing herds are now lulled to repose,
And hushed are the sounds from the hamlet that rose,
And the music that flowed from the spray.
How solemn the Hour! In their splendid career
The planets revolving are seen;
And the proud towering hills 'neath their glimmering appear
As the shadows of things that have been.
Dread Silence, her empire o'er Nature to prove,
Forbids that a whisper be heard in the vale,
Save the breeze breathing soft through the far-stretching grove,
And the light curling waves in sweet cadence that move
Where the lake's gently kissed by the gale.
From behind yon dark hill, in deep sable arrayed,
The moon soars majestic and slow;
And her mild-beaming rays sweetly pierce thro' the shade
Of the thicket that waves on its brow—
And now her full orb o'er the mountain impending,
Sublime in bright glory she glows in the sky;
A stream of soft light o'er the vallies descending;
On the lake's silver breast trees and cottages blending
With the splendours effulgent on high.
Great Ruler of all! while transported I view
This fabric so glorious and fair,
Oh! teach me, with rapture and reverence due,
To trace benign Deity there—
Serene as yon orbs in thy radiance shine,
And light, life, and joy to creation impart,
So fair from my soul beam thine image divine,
And fervent, diffusive, unchanging like thine,
May benevolence glow in my heart. S.
Lines
Written in Spring—1812.
Redeemed from Winter's deadening reign,
The joyful year revives again;
And flings, with rule-rejecting mirth,
Her gladdening glories o'er the earth.
Through her full veins the transports run,
And hark! the woodland hymn's begun—
From the close-foliaged grove the thrill
Comes softened up the breezy hill,
With ceaseless bleat, and frequent low,
And mountain-rivulets' dashing flow,
And all the stir and din below.
