How warm this woodland wild Recess !
Love surely hath been breathing here;
And this sweet bed of heath, my dear!
Swells up, then sinks with faint caress,
As if to have you yet more near.
Eight springs have flown, since last I lay On sea-ward Quantock's heathy hills, Where quiet sounds from hidden rills Float here and there, like things astray, And high o'er head the sky-lark shrills.
No voice as yet had made the air
Be music with your name; yet why That asking look? that yearning sigh? That sense of promise every where? Beloved! flew your spirit by?
As when a mother doth explore
The rose-mark on her long lost child,
I met, I loved you, maiden mild!
As whom I long had loved before—
So deeply, had I been beguiled.
You stood before me like a thought,
A dream remembered in a dream.
But when those meek eyes first did seem
To tell me, Love within you wrought-
O Greta, dear domestic stream!
Has not, since then, Love's prompture deep,
Has not Love's whisper evermore
Been ceaseless, as thy gentle roar?
Sole voice, when other voices sleep,
Dear under-song in clamor's hour.
THE PANG MORE SHARP THAN ALL.
HE too has flitted from his secret nest,
Hope's last and dearest Child without a name !
Has flitted from me, like the warmthless flame,
That makes false promise of a place of rest
To the tir'd Pilgrim's still believing mind;-
Or like some Elfin Knight in kingly court,
Who having won all guerdons in his sport,
Glides out of view, and whither none can find!
Yes! He hath flitted from me-with what aim,
Or why, I know not! 'Twas a home of bliss,
And he was innocent, as the pretty shame
Of babe, that tempts and shuns the menaced kiss,
From its twy-cluster'd hiding place of snow!
Pure as the babe, I ween, and all aglow
As the dear hopes, that swell the mother's breast-
Her eyes down gazing o'er her clasped charge;-
Yet gay as that twice happy father's kiss,
That well might glance aside, yet never miss, Where the sweet mark emboss'd so sweet a targe— Twice wretched he who hath been doubly blest!
Like a loose blossom on a gusty night
He flitted from me-
e—and has left behind
(As if to them his faith he ne'er did plight)
Of either sex and answerable mind
Two playmates, twin-births of his foster-dame :-
The one a steady lad (Esteem he hight)
And Kindness is the gentler sister's name.
Dim likeness now, tho' fair she be and good,
Of that bright Boy who hath us all forsook;-
But in his full-eyed aspect when he stood,
And while her face reflected every look,
And in reflection kindled-she became
So like Him, that almost she seem'd the same!
Ah! He is gone, and yet will not depart !-
Is with me still, yet I from Him exil'd!
For still there lives within my secret heart
The magic image of the magic Child,
Which there He made up-grow by his strong art
As in that crystal* orb-wise Merlin's feat,-
The wondrous "World of Glass," wherein inisl'd
All long'd for things their beings did repeat
And there He left it, like a Sylph beguiled,
To live and yearn and languish incomplete!
*Faerie Queene, B. III. c. 2. s. 19.
Can wit of man a heavier grief reveal?
Can sharper pang from hate or scorn arise ?—
Yes! one more sharp there is that deeper lies,
Which fond Esteem but mocks when he would heal.
Yet neither scorn nor hate did it devise,
But sad compassion and atoning zeal!
One pang more blighting-keen than hope betray'd!
And this it is my woful hap to feel,
When at her Brother's hest, the twin-born Maid
With face averted and unsteady eyes,
Her truant playmate's faded robe puts on;
And inly shrinking from her own disguise
Enacts the faery Boy that's lost and gone.
O worse than all! O pang all pangs above
Is Kindness counterfeiting absent Love!
Yea, he deserves to find himself deceived,
Who seeks a Heart in the unthinking Man.
Like shadows on a stream, the forms of life
Impress their characters on the smooth forehead:
Nought sinks into the bosom's silent depth.
Quick sensibility of pain and pleasure
Moves the light fluids lightly; but no soul
Warmeth the inner frame.-SCHILLER.
ON HAVING LEFT A PLACE OF RETIREMENT.
Low was our pretty Cot: our tallest rose
Peeped at the chamber-window. We could hear
At silent noon, and eve, and early morn,
The sea's faint murmur. In the open air
Our myrtles blossomed; and across the porch
Thick jasmins twined: the little landscape round
Was green and woody, and refreshed the eye.
It was a spot which you might aptly call
The Valley of Seclusion! Once I saw
(Hallowing his Sabbath-day by quietness)
A wealthy son of commerce saunter by,
Bristowa's citizen: methought, it calmed
His thirst of idle gold, and made him muse
With wiser feelings: for he paused, and looked
With a pleased sadness, and gazed all around,
Then eyed our Cottage, and gazed round again,
And sighed, and said, it was a Blessed Place.
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