I AM a daughter of that land

Where the poet's lip and the painter's hand
Are most divine,-where the earth and sky,
Are picture both and poetry-

I am of Florence. 'Mid the chill
Of hope and feeling, oh! I still
Am proud to think to where I owe
My birth, though but the dawn of woe!

My childhood pass'd 'mid radiant things, Glorious as Hope's imaginings; Statues but known from shapes of the earth, By being too lovely for mortal birth; Paintings whose colours of life were caught From the fairy tints in the rainbow wrought; Music whose sighs had a spell like those That float on the sea at the evening's close; Language so silvery, that every word Was like the lute's awakening chord; Skies half sunshine, and half starlight; Flowers whose lives were a breath of delight; Leaves whose green pomp knew no withering; Fountains bright as the skies of our spring; And songs whose wild and passionate line Suited a soul of romance like mine.

My power was but a woman's power;
Yet, in that great and glorious dower
Which Genius gives, I had my part:
I poured my full and burning heart
In song, and on the canvass made
My dreams of beauty visible;

I knew not which I loved the most-
Pencil or lute, both loved so well.

Oh, yet my pulse throbs to recall, When first upon the gallery's wall Picture of mine was placed, to share Wonder and praise from each one there! Sad were my shades; methinks they had Aimost a tone of prophecy

I ever had, from earliest youth,
A feeling what my fate would be.

My first was of a gorgeous hall, Lighted up for festival;

Braided tresses, and cheeks of bloom, Diamond agraff, and foam-white plume;

Censors of roses, vases of light,

Like what the moon sheds on a summer night.
Youths and maidens with link'd hands,
Joined in the graceful sarabands,
Smiled on the canvass; but apart

Was one who leant in silent mood,
As revelry to his sick heart

Were worse than veriest solitude.
Pale, dark-eyed, beautiful, and young,
Such as he had shone o'er my slumbers,
When I had only slept to dream

Over again his magic numbers.

Divinest Petrarch! he whose lyre,
Like morning light, half dew, half fire,
To Laura and to love was vow'd-
He looked on one, who with the crowd
Mingled, but mix'd not; on whose cheek
There was a blush, as if she knew
Whose look was fix'd on hers. Her eye,

Of a spring sky's delicious blue,
Had not the language of that bloom,
But mingling tears, and light, and gloom,
Was raised abstractedly to Heaven :-
No sign was to her lover given.
I painted her with golden tresses,
Such as float on the wind's caresses,
When the laburnums wildly fling
Their sunny blossoms to the spring,
A cheek which had the crimson hue
Upon the sun touched nectarine;
A lip of perfume and of dew;

A brow like twilight's darken'd line.

I strove to catch each charm that long
Has lived, thanks to her lover's song!
Each grace he number'd one by one,
That shone in her of Avignon.

I ever thought that poet's fate
Utterly lone and desolate.
It is the spirit's bitterest pain
To love, to be beloved again;

And yet between a gulf which ever

The hearts that burn to meet must sever.
And he was vowed to one sweet star,
Bright yet to him, but bright afar.

O'er some, Love's shadow may but pass
As passes the breath stain o'er glass;

And pleasures, cares, and pride combined, Fill up the blank Love leaves behind. But there are some whose love is high, Entire, and sole idolatry;

Who, turning from a heartless world,

Ask some dear thing, which may renew Affection's several links, and be

As true as they themselves are true. But Love's bright fount is never pure; And all his pilgrims must endure All passion's mighty suffering Ere they may reach the blessed spring. And some who waste their lives to find A prize which they may never win: Like those who search for Irem's groves, Which found, they may not enter in. Where is the sorrow but appears In Love's long catalogue of tears? And some there are who leave the path In agony and fierce disdain; But bear upon each cankered breast The scar that never heals again.

My next was of a minstrel too, Who proved that woman's hand might do, When, true to the heart pulse, it woke

The harp. Her head was bending down, As if in weariness, and near,

But unworn, was a laurel crown.
She was not beautiful, if bloom
And smiles form beauty; for, like death,
Her brow was ghastly; and her lip
Was parched, as fever were its breath.
There was a shade upon her dark,
Large, floating eyes, as if each spark
Of minstrel ecstasy was fled,
Yet leaving them no tears to shed;
Fix'd in their hopelessness of care,
And reckless in their great despair.
She sat beneath a cypress tree,
A little fountain ran beside,
And, in the distance, one dark rock
Threw its long shadow o'er the tide;
And to the west, where the nightfall
Was darkening day's gemm'd coronal,
Its white shafts crimsoning in the sky,
Arose the sun-god's sanctuary.

I deemed, that of lyre, life, and love

She was a long, last farewell taking ;

That, from her pale and parch'd lips,
Her latest, wildest song was breaking.

SAPPHO'S SONG.

FAREWELL, my lute!—and would that I

Had never waked thy burning chords! Poison has been upon thy sigh,

And fever has breathed in thy words.

Yet wherefore, wherefore should I blame
Thy power, thy spell, my gentlest lute?
I should have been the wretch I am,
Had every chord of thine been mute.

It was my evil star above,

Not my sweet lute, that'wrought me wrong; It was not song that taught me love, But it was love that taught me song.

If song be past, and hope undone,

And pulse, and head, and heart, are flame; It is thy work, thou faithless one! But, no!-I will not name thy name!

Sun-god! lute, wreath are vowed to thee!
Long be their light upon my grave—
My glorious grave-yon deep blue sea:
I shall sleep calm-beneath its wave!

FLORENCE! with what idolatry

I've lingered in thy radiant halls, Worshipping, till my dizzy eye

Grew dim with gazing on those walls, Where Time had spared each glorious gift By Genius unto Memory left!

And when seen by the pale moonlight,
More pure, more perfect, though less bright,
What dreams of song flashed on my brain,
Till each shade seem'd to live again;
And then the beautiful, the grand,
The glorious of my native land,
In every flower that threw its veil
Aside, when woo'd by the spring gale;
In every vineyard, where the sun,
His task of summer ripening done,
Shone on their clusters, and a song
Came lightly from the peasant throng;-

In the dim loveliness of night,

In fountains with their diamond light,

In aged temple, ruin'd shrine,
And its green wreath of ivy twine ;—
In every change of earth and sky,
Breathed the deep soul of poesy.

As yet I loved not;-but each wild, High thought I nourish'd rais'd a pyre For love to light; and lighted once By love, it would be like the fire The burning lava floods that dwell In Etna's cave unquenchable.

One evening in the lovely June,

Over the Arno's waters gliding,

I had been watching the fair moon
Amid her court of white clouds riding:

I had been listening to the gale,

Which wafted music from around,

(For scarce a lover, at that hour,

But waked his mandolin's light sound.)And odour was upon the breeze, Sweet thefts from rose and lemon trees.

They stole me from my lulling dream,
And said they knew that such an hour
Had ever influence on my soul,

And raised my sweetest minstrel power.
I took my lute, my eye had been
Wandering round the lovely scene,
Fill'd with those melancholy tears,
Which come when all most bright appears,
And hold their strange and secret power,
Even on pleasure's golden hour.

I had been looking on the river,
Half-marvelling to think that ever
Wind, wave, or sky, could darken where
All seem'd so gentle and so fair:

And mingled with these thoughts there came
A tale, just one that memory keeps-
Forgotten music, till some chance
Vibrate the chord whereon it sleeps!

A MOORISH ROMANCE.

SOFTLY through the pomegranate groves
Came the gentle song of the doves;
Shone the fruit in the evening light,
Like Indian rubies, blood-red and bright;
Shook the date-trees each tufted head,
As the passing wind their green nuts shed;
And, like dark columns, amid the sky
The giant palms ascended on high:
And the mosque's gilded minaret
Glisten'd and glanced as the daylight set.
Over the town a crimson haze

Gather'd and hung of the evening's rays;
And far beyond, like molten gold,
The burning sands of the desert roll'd.
Far to the left, the sky and sea
Mingled their gray immensity;
And with flapping sail and idle prow
The vessels threw their shades below
Far down the beach, where a cypress grove
Casts its shade round a little cove,
Darkling and green, with just a space
For the stars to shine on the water's face,
A small bark lay, waiting for night
And its breeze to waft and hide its flight.
Sweet is the burthen, and lovely the freight,
For which those furled-up sails await,
To a garden, fair as those
Where the glory of the rose
Blushes, charm'd from the decay
That wastes other blooms away;

Gardens of the fairy tale

Told, till the wood fire grows pale,

By the Arab tribes, when night,
With its dim and lovely light,
And its silence, suiteth well
With the magic tales they tell.
Through that cypress avenue,
Such a garden meets the view,
Fill'd with flowers-flowers that seem
Lighted up by the sunbeam;
Fruits of gold and gems, and leaves
Green as hope before it grieves
O'er the false and brokenhearted,
All with which its youth has parted,
Never to return again,
Save in memories of pain!

There is a white rose in yon bower,
But holds it a yet fairer flower:
And music from that cage is breathing,
Round which a jasmine braid is wreathing,
A low song from a lonely dove,
A song such exiles sing and love,
Breathing of fresh fields, summer skies,—
Not to be breathed of but in sighs!
But fairer smile and sweeter sigh
Are near when LEILA's step is nigh!
With eyes dark as the midnight time,
Yet lighted like a summer clime
With sun-rays from within; yet now
Lingers a cloud upon that brow,—
Though never lovelier brow was given
To Houri of an Eastern heaven!
Her eye is dwelling on that bower,
As every leaf and every flower
Were being number'd in her heart;-

There are no looks like those which dwell On long-remember'd things, which soon Must take our first and last farewell.

Day fades apace: another day,
That maiden will be far away,
A wanderer o'er the dark-blue sea,
And bound for lovely Italy,

Her mother's land! Hence, on her breast

The cross beneath a Moorish vest;
And hence those sweetest sounds, that scem
Like music murmuring in a dream,
When in our sleeping ear is ringing
The song the nightingale is singing;
When by that white and funeral stone,
Half hidden by the cypress gloom,
The hymn the mother taught her child

Is sung each evening at her tomb.
But quick the twilight time has past,
Like one of those sweet calms that last
A moment and no more, to cheer
The turmoil of our pathway here.

The bark is waiting in the bay,
Night darkens round:-LEILA, away!

Far, ere to-morrow, o'er the tide,

Or wait and be-ABDALLA's bride?

She touch'd her lute-never again Her ear will listen to its strain! She took her cage, first kiss'd the breastThen freed the white dove prison'd there: It paused one moment on her hand,

Then spread its glad wings to the air. She drank the breath, as it were health, That sigh'd from every scented blossom; And taking from each one a leaf,

Hid them, like spells, upon her bosom. Then sought the sacred path again

She once before had traced, when lay A Christian in her father's chain;

And gave him gold, and taught the way
To fly. She thought upon the night,
When, like an angel of the light,
She stood before the prisoner's sight,
And led him to the cypress grove,
And show'd the bark and hidden cove;
And bade the wandering captive flee,
In words he knew from infancy!
And when she thought how for her love
He had braved slavery and death,
That he might only breathe the air

Made sweet and sacred by her breath.
She reach'd the grove of cypresses—
Another step is by her side:
Another moment, and the bark

Bears the fair Moor across the tide!

"Twas beautiful, by the pale moonlight, To mark her eyes,-now dark, now bright, As now they met, now shrank away,

O'er head a sullen scream was heard,
As sought the land the white sea bird,
Her pale wings like a meteor streaming.
Upon the waves a light is gleaming-
Ill-omen'd brightness, sent by Death
To light the night-black depths beneath.
The vessel roll'd amid the surge;
The winds howl'd round it, like a dirge
Sung by some savage race. Then came
The rush of thunder and of flame:
It show'd two forms upon the deck,-
One clasp'd around the other's neck,
As there she could not dream of fear-
In her lover's arms could danger be near?
He stood and watch'd her with the eye
Of fix'd and silent agony.
The waves swept on: he felt her heart

Beat closer and closer yet to his!
They burst upon the ship!-the sea

Has closed upon their dream of bliss!

Surely theirs is a pleasant sleep

Beneath that ancient cedar tree, Whose solitary stem has stood

For years alone beside the sea! The last of a most noble race, That once had there their dwelling-place, Long past away! Beneath its shade, A soft green couch the turf had made :And glad the morning sun is shining On those beneath the boughs reclining. Nearer the fisher drew. He saw

The dark hair of the Moorish maid, Like a veil, floating o'er the breast Where tenderly her head was laid ;— And yet her lover's arm was placed Clasping around the graceful waist;

day.

They stood on the deck, and the midnight gale
Just waved the maiden's silver veil-
Just lifted a curl, as if to show

The cheek of rose that was burning below:
And never spread a sky of blue

More clear for the stars to wander through!
And never could their mirror be
A calmer or a lovelier sea!

For every wave was a diamond gleam:
And that light vessel well may seem

A fairy ship, and that graceful pair

Young Genii, whose home was of light and air!

Another evening came, but dark;
The storm clouds hover'd round the bark

Of misery :-they just could see

The distant shore of Italy,

As the dim moon through vapours shone

A few short rays, her light was gone.

Were dripping wet with foam and blood; And that the maiden's tresses dark

Were heavy with the briny flood!
Wo for the wind!-wo for the wave!
They sleep the slumber of the grave!
They buried them beneath that tree;
It long had been a sacred spot.
Soon it was planted round with flowers
By many who had not forgot;
Or yet lived in those dreams of truth
The Eden birds of early youth,

That make the loveliness of love:

And call'd the place "THE MAIDEN'S COVE,"
That she who perish'd in the sca
Might thus be kept in memory.

FROM many a lip came sounds of praise,

Like music from sweet voices ringing;

For many a boat had gather'd round, To list the song I had been singing. There are some moments in our fate

That stamp the colour of our days; As, till then, life had not been felt,

And mine was seal'd in the slight gaze
Which fix'd my eye, and fired my brain,
And bow'd my heart beneath the chain.
"Twas a dark and flashing eye,
Shadows, too, that tenderly,

With almost female softness, came
O'er its mingled gloom and flame.
His cheek was pale; or toil, or care,
Or midnight study, had been there,
Making its young colours dull,
Yet leaving it most beautiful.
Raven curls their shadow threw,
Like the twilight's darkening hue,
O'er the pure and mountain snow
Of his high and haughty brow:
Lighted by a smile, whose spell
Words are powerless to tell.
Such a lip!-oh, pour'd from thence
Lava floods of eloquence
Would come with fiery energy,
Like those words that cannot die.
Words the Grecian warrior spoke
When the Persian's chain he broke,
Or that low and honey tone,
Making woman's heart his own;
Such as should be heard at night,
In the dim and sweet starlight;
Sounds that haunt a beauty's sleep,
Treasures for her heart to keep.
Like the pine of summer tall;
Apollo, on his pedestal

In our own gallery, never bent
More graceful, more magnificent;
Ne'er look'd the hero, or the king,
More nobly than the youth who now,
As if soul-centred in my song,

Was leaning on a galley's prow.
He spoke not when the others spoke,
His heart was all too full for praise;
But his dark eyes kept fix'd on mine,
Which sank beneath their burning gaze.
Mine sank-but yet I felt the thrill
Of that look burning on me still.

I heard no word that others said-
Heard nothing, save one low-breathed sigh.
My hand kept wandering on my lute,
In music, but unconsciously
My pulses throbb'd, my heart beat high,
A flush of dizzy ecstasy

Crimson'd my cheek; I felt warm tears
Dimming my sight, yet was it sweet,
My wild heart's most bewildering beat,

Consciousness, without hopes or fears,

Of a new power within me waking,
Like light before the morn's full breaking.
I left the boat-the crowd: my mood
Made my soul pant for solitude.

Amid my palace halls was one,
The most peculiarly my own:
The roof was blue and fretted gold,
The floor was of the Parian stone,
Shining like snow, as only meet
For the light tread of fairy feet;
And in the midst, beneath a shade
Of cluster'd rose, a fountain play'd,
Sprinkling its scented waters round,
With a sweet and lulling sound,—
O'er oranges, like Eastern gold,
Half hidden by the dark green fold

Of their large leaves;-o'er hyacinth bells,
Where every summer odour dwells,
And, nestled in the midst, a pair

Of white wood doves, whose home was there;
And like an echo to their song,

At times a murmur past along;
A dying tone, a plaining fall,
So sad, so wild, so musical-
As the wind swept across the wire,
And waked my lone Æolian lyre,
Which lay upon the casement, where
The lattice woo'd the cold night air,
Half hidden by a bridal twine
Of jasmine with the emerald vine.
And ever as the curtains made
A varying light, a changeful shade,
As the breeze waved them to and fro,
Came on the eye the glorious show
Of pictured walls where landscape wild
Of wood, and stream, or mountain piled,
Or sunny vale, or twilight grove,

Or shapes whose every look was love;
Saints, whose diviner glance seem'd caught
From Heaven, some whose earthlier thought
Was yet more lovely,-shone like gleams
Of Beauty's spirit seen in dreams.

I threw me on a couch to rest,

Loosely I flung my long black hair;
It seem'd to soothe my troubled breast
To drink the quiet evening air.

I look'd upon the deep-blue sky,
And it was all hope and harmony.
Afar I could see the Arno's stream
Glorying in the clear moonbeam;
And the shadowy city met my gaze,
Like the dim memory of other days;
And the distant wood's black coronal
Was like oblivion that covereth all.
I know not why my soul felt sad;

I touch'd my lute,—it would not waken, Save to old songs of sorrowing