Chapter II

In joyous days are many
The friends we find;
In dark ones scarcely any,
To soothe the mind.
But friends in hours of sorrow
Far more we prize
Than those that go to-morrow
If storms arise.

THE CLOUDS ARE BLUSHING.

The clouds are blushing, the sun is gone,
He has been kissing them, every one,
Except the shy ones, that kept away,
And tearfully watched his parting ray;
But they love him no less
For their bashfulness;
The truest of lovers are not the most gay.

The sun is gone, and the blushing clouds
Are growing dimmer, as Night enshrouds
Sky, sea and land in her sombre pall--
The sexton at old Earth’s funeral,
When her race is run,
And her work is done,
And her children are weaned from her, one and all.

The Man of the Moon has lit his lamp,
And is now commencing his airy tramp,
To see how the stars, those merry elves
That wink as he passes, behave themselves.
With steady pace
He is running his race,
Holding his lamp with a dignified grace.

The sun is rising behind the hill,
And I am waiting and watching still--
Waiting and watching, as night goes by,
What queer little scenes take place in the sky,
When the silence is deep
And men are asleep,
And none are awake but the stars and I!

MAY, 1859.

UNSPOKEN.

.... Quis prodere tanta relatu .... possit?

--_Claudian._

There is a voice that never stirs the lips,--
Felt, but not heard; that vibrates through the soul,--
A solemn music; but no human speech
Can give that music to the ambient air.

The noblest poem poet ever wrote;
The brightest picture artist ever drew;
The loftiest music lyrist ever sung;
The gentlest accents woman ever spoke,--
Are paraphrases of a felt original,
That lip, or pen, or pencil, cannot show
Unto the seeing eye or listening ear.
The thoughts we utter are but half themselves.
The poet knows this well. The artist knows
His hands bear not the burden of his thoughts
Upon the canvas. The musician knows
His soul must ever perish on his lips.
Even the eye,--“the window of the soul,”--
Though it may shed a light a little way,
Gives but a glimpse of that which burns within.

The sweet, unconscious tenderness of flowers;
The boundless awe of star-encircled night;
The tear that trickles down an old man’s cheek;
Ocean’s loud pulse, that makes our own beat high;
The vocal throb of a great multitude;
The pause when we have heard and said “Farewell,”
And feel the pressure of a hand that’s gone;
The thought that we have wronged our truest friend,
When he is sleeping in the arms of Death;
The silent, fathomless anguish that engulfs
Him who has found the precious power to love,
And sees that all he loves is torn from him;
His dying moments who is void of hope;
Jezebel; Nero; Judas; any one
Of all the hideous things that crawled through life
In human form;--what mortal could express
All that he feels in one or all of these,
Giving the very image of his thought?

Life, Death, Hell, Judgment, Resurrection, GOD--
Who can express their meaning? Who can bound
Awe that is infinite in finite words?

Thus much of us must ever be concealed--
Spite of the high ambition to be born
Of what is noblest in us,--till His breath
Who woke the morning stars to sing their song,
Awakes our souls to fuller utterance.

JEPHTHAH.

JUDGES xi.

I.

Rejoice ye tribes of Israel, the Lord was on your side,
Your fierce and daring enemies have fallen in their pride.
In vain the heathen strove against Jehovah’s awful word,
For Ammon’s proud, presumptuous sons have perished by the sword.

II.

From Aroer to Minnith and to Abel’s fertile plain
Of twenty noble cities the “mighty men” are slain;
Rejoice, thou son of Gilead, the Lord hath heard thy vow,--
Thy foes are crushed, thy father’s sons before thy presence bow.

III.

It is an hour of triumph to the warrior and his band,
An hour of stern rejoicing to all the chosen land,
When the conqueror of Ammon, the valiant of his race,
Beholds once more, with well-earned joy, his long-lost native place.

IV.

But who is this advancing with gay attendant crowd?
O Jephthah! dost remember now the vow that thou hast vowed?
Why is thy face so ghastly pale? why sinks thy noble head?
Thy daughter’s blood must now atone for all that thou hast shed!

V.

Honour and pomp and victory are all forgotten now,
And clouds of darkest anguish sweep across the father’s brow.
He speaks--his words are words of death: he orders--is obeyed--
And lonely mountains mourn the fate of Israel’s queenly maid.