TO ONE IN A DARKENED HOUSE. The immeasurable woe. As, from a shining window cast, O vanished firelight!-dark, without, If I could hide your gloom with light, Or breathe you back the warmth of old ... Oh vain! I stand in outer night, And feel your inner cold! AWAKE IN DARKNESS. MOTHER, if I could cry from out the night Would call you, call you, sharp and plaintively!. Oh vain, vain, vain! Your face I could not see; Your voice no more would bring my darkness light. To this shut room, though I should wail and weep, You would not come to speak one brooding word, And let its comfort warm me into sleep, And leave me dreaming of its comfort heard: Though all the night to morn at last should creep, My cry would fail, your answer be deferred. SONNET-IN 1862. STERN be the Pilot in the dreadful hour When a great nation, like a ship at sea And awful tenderness of voted power. From our hot records then thy name shall stand And only paid in never-ending praise— Made by God's providence the Anointed One. THE UNBENDED BOW. In some old realm, we read, when war had come, Oh sacred Land! not many years ago (The symbol breathes its meaning evermore), Thy holy summons, came the bended bowThy fiery bearers moved from door to door. Then sprang thy brave from threshold and from hearth; O tender wife, in all thy weakness stern With the great purpose which thy husband drew; O mother dreaming of thy son's return, Strong with the arm whose strength thy country knew ; O maiden, proud to hold a hero's name Close in thy prayerful silence, blameless: lo, Transfigured in the light of love and fame, They come, the bearers of the unbended bow! "The strife is hushed, O Land!"-this voice is plain"The bow of Peace is borne from door to door : May thy dread power be never tried again; But let thine arrows shine for evermore." AUTHOR UNKNOWN. [The following is a specimen of Negro Hymn-writing. It was in actual use, with musical accompaniment, among the slaves of the Southern States]. LITTLE CHILDREN, THEN WON'T YOU BE GLAD? (ARKANSAS.) LITTLE children, then won't you be glad, That you have been to heaven, an' you're gwine to go again, For to try on the long white robe? King Jesus he was so strong, my Lord, Don't you hear what de chariot say? Don't you 'member what you promise de Lord? A Lady asks the Minstrel's rhyme A little blind girl wandering A lovely sky, a cloudless sun A march in the ranks hard-pressed, and the road unknown A sight in camp in the daybreak grey and dim A silver javelin which the hills PAGE 160 133 174 398 285 34 242 197 A sound of tumult troubles all the air A weary, wandering soul am I A whisper woke the air Aboard, at a ship's helm Above the petty passions of the crowd Above the sunken sun the clouds are fired Absence from thee is something worse than death All grim and soiled and brown with tan Am I not all alone?-The world is still 316 Come, I will make the continent indissoluble Come up from the fields, father, here's a letter from our Pete Content, in purple lustre clad Courage yet! my brother or my sister Daughter of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring PAGE 247 312 194 283 98 Dearest, a look is but a ray Death never came so nigh to me before Dying, still slowly dying Each Orpheus must to the depths descend Fair isle that from the fairest of all flowers Farewell, dear child, my heart's too much content Flood-tide below me! I watch you face to face. Four points divide the skies From all the rest I single out you, having a message for y Give me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling 186 352 193 399 489 206 3 42 273 193 69 196 8 308 372 318 97 235 337 160 231 180 40 442 462 220 How soon, my dear, death may my steps attend I am the Muse who sung alway |