Page images
PDF
EPUB

THE RAVEN.

283

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or

devil!

Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchantedIn this home by horror haunted-tell me truly, I imploreIs there is there balm in Gilead?-tell me-tell me, I implore !”

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore !"

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil !-prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that heaven that bends above us―by that God we both

adore,

Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels name Le

nore;

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels name Lenore !"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore !"

"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting

"Get thee back into the tempest and the night's Plutonian

shore !

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath

spoken!

Leave my loneliness unbroken !—quit the bust above my

door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"

[blocks in formation]

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the Aoor

Shall be lifted-nevermore!

EDGAR A. POE.

'T'

My Thirty-sixth Year.

MISSOLONGHI, Jan. 22, 1824.

IS time this heart should be unmoved,
Since others it hath ceased to move:

Yet though I cannot be beloved,

Still let me love!

My days are in the yellow leaf,

The flowers and fruits of love are gone:
The worm, the canker, and the grief,
Are mine alone!

The fire that in my bosom preys
Is like to some volcanic isle:
No torch is kindled at its blaze-
A funeral pile!

The hope, the fear, the jealous care,
The exalted portion of the pain
And power of Love, I cannot share,
But wear the chain!

But 't is not thus-and 't is not here

Such thoughts should shake my soul, nor now,

Where glory decks the hero's bier,

Or binds his brow.

LOSSES.

The sword, the banner, and the field,
Glory and Greece around me see!
The Spartan, borne upon his shield,
Was not more free!

285

Awake!-not Greece-she is awake!—
Awake my spirit! Think through whom
Thy life-blood tracks its parent lake,
And then strike home!

Tread those reviving passions down
Unworthy manhood,-unto thee
Indifferent should the smile or frown
Of beauty be.

If thou regrett'st thy youth, why live?
The land of honorable death
Is here:-up to the field, and give
Away thy breath!

Seck out-less often sought than found--
A soldier's grave, for thee the best;
Then look around and choose thy ground,
And take thy rest.

LORD BYRON.

Losses.

PON the white sea-sand

UPON

There sat a pilgrim band,

Telling the losses that their lives had known;

While evening waned away

From breezy cliff and bay,

And the strong tides went out with weary moan.

One spake, with quivering lip,

Of a fair freighted ship,

With all his household to the deep gone down;
But one had wilder woe-

For a fair face long ago

Lost in the darker depths of a great town.

There were who mourned their youth
With a most loving ruth,

For its brave hopes and memories ever green;
And one upon the West

Turned an eye that would not rest,

For far-off hills whereon its joy had been.

Some talked of vanished gold,

Some of proud honors told,

Some spake of friends that were their trust no more; And one of a green grave

Beside a foreign wave,

That made him sit so lonely on the shore.

But when their tales were done,

There spake among them one,

A stranger, seeming from all sorrow free:

"Sad losses have ye met,

But mine is heavier yet;

For a believing heart hath gone from me."

"Alas!" these pilgrims said,

"For the living and the dead

For fortune's cruelty, for love's sore cross,

For the wrecks of land and sea!

But, however it came to thee,

Thine, stranger, is life's last and heaviest loss."

FRANCES BROWN.

GOING OUT AND COMING IN.

287

IN

Going Out and Coming In.

N that home was joy and sorrow, where an infant first drew breath,

While an aged sire was drawing near unto the gates of

death

His feebie pulse was failing and his eye was growing dim,He was standing on the threshold when they brought the babe to him:

While to murmur forth a blessing on the little one he tried, In his trembling arms he raised it, pressed it to his lips-and died!

An awful darkness resteth on the path they both begin,

Who thus meet upon the threshold-Going out and Coming

in!

Going out unto the triumph, coming in unto the fight: Coming in unto the darkness, going out unto the light,Although the shadow deepened in the moment of eclipse, When he passed through the dread portal with a blessing on

his lips:

And to him who bravely conquers as he conquered in the strife,

Life is but the way of dying, death is but the gate of life.
Yet awful darkness resteth on the path we all begin,
When we meet upon the threshold-Going out and Coming

in.

ISABELLA CRAIG.

NOW

For a Timepiece.

!-it is gone. Our brief hours travel post,

Each with its thought or deed, its Why or How ;—

But know, each parting hour gives up a ghost,

To dwell within thee-an eternal Now!

SAMUEL T. COLERIDGE.

« PreviousContinue »