Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

MY

Sarah Jane Haie.

THE LIGHT OF HOME.

Y son, thou wilt dream the world is fair,
And thy spirit will sigh to roam —

And thou must go ;-but never, when there,
Forget the light of home!

Though Pleasure may smile with a ray more bright

It dazzles to lead astray;

Like the meteor's flash, 'twill deepen the night
When treading thy lonely way:

But the hearth of home has a constant flame,
And pure as vestal fire;

"Twill burn, 'twill burn forever the same,
For Nature feeds the pyre.

The sea of Ambition is tempest-tossed,
And thy hopes may vanish like foam:
When sails are shivered and compass lost,
Then look to the light of home!

And there, like a star through the midnight cloud
Thou shalt see the beacon bright;

For never, till shining on thy shroud,
Can be quenched its holy light.

The sun of Fame may gild the name,
But the heart ne'er felt its ray;

And Fashion's smiles, that rich ones claim,
Are beams of a wintry day;

How cold and dim those beams would be, Should life's poor wanderer come!My son, when the world is dark to thee, Then turn to the light of home.

THE TWO MAIDENS.

NE came with light and laughing air,

ON

And cheek like opening blossom— Bright gems were twined amid her hair, And glittered on her bosom ;

And pearls and costly diamonds deck
Her round white arms and lovely neck.

Like summer's sky, with stars bedight,
The jewelled robe around her,
And dazzling as the noontide light

The radiant zone that bound her-
And pride and joy were in her eye,
And mortals bowed as she passed by.

Another came: o'er her sweet face

A pensive shade was stealing;
Yet there no grief of earth we trace-
But the Heaven-hallowed feeling

Which mourns the heart should ever stray
From the pure fount of truth away.

Around her brow, as snow-drop fair,
The glossy tresses cluster,

Nor pearl nor ornament was there,
Save the meek spirit's lustre ;

And faith and hope beamed in her eye,
And angels bowed as she passed by.

John G. C. Brainard.

THE DEEP.

HERE'S beauty in the deep:

TH

The wave is bluer than the sky;

And, though the lights shine bright on high,
More softly do the sea-gems glow,
That sparkle in the depths below;
The rainbow's tints are only made
When on the waters they are laid;
And sun and moon most sweetly shine
Upon the ocean's level brine.

There's beauty in the deep.

[ocr errors]

There's music in the deep :-
It is not in the surf's rough roar,
Nor in the whispering, shelly shore,-
They are but earthly sounds, that tell
How little of the sea-nymph's shell,
That sends its loud, clear note abroad,
Or winds its softness through the flood,
Echoes through groves, with coral gay,
And dies, on spongy banks, away

There's music in the deep.

There's quiet in the deep:-
Above, let tides and tempests rave,
And earth-born whirlwinds wake the wave:
Above, let Care and Fear contend
With Sin and Sorrow, to the end:
Here, far beneath the tainted foam
That frets above our peaceful home,
We dream in joy, and wake in love,
Nor know the rage that yells above.
There's quiet in the deep.

WHAT

[blocks in formation]

HAT is there saddening in the autumn leaves?
Have they that "green and yellow melancholy

That the sweet poet spake of?-Had he seen
Our variegated woods, when first the frost
Turns into beauty all October's charms-
When the dread fever quits us-when the storms
Of the wild equinox, with all its wet,

Has left the land, as the first Deluge left it,
With a bright bow of many colours hung
Upon the forest-tops-he had not sighed.

The moon stays longest for the hunter now.
The trees cast down their fruitage, and the blithe
And busy squirrel hoards his winter store:

While man enjoys the breeze that sweeps along
The bright, blue sky above him, and that bends
Magnificently all the forest's pride,

Or whispers through the evergreens, and asks,
"What is there saddening in the autumn leaves ?"

[ocr errors]

ΟΝ

THE SEA-BIRD'S SONG.

N the deep is the mariner's danger, On the deep is the mariner's deathWho, to fear of the tempest a stranger, Sees the last bubble burst of his breath? 'Tis the sea-bird, sea-bird, sea-bird, Lone looker on despair

The sea-bird, sea-bird, sea-bird,
The only witness there.

Who watches their course, who so mildly
Careen to the kiss of the breeze!
Who lists to their shrieks, who so wildly
Are clasped in the arms of the seas?
'Tis the sea-bird, &c.

Who hovers on high o'er the lover,
And her who has clung to his neck?
Whose wing is the wing that can cover,
With its shadow, the foundering wreck
'Tis the sea-bird, etc.

My eye in the light of the billow,
My wing on the wake of the wave,
I shall take to my breast, for a pillow,
The shroud of the fair and the brave.

I'm a sea-bird, &c.

My foot on the iceberg has lighted,

When hoarse the wild winds veer about;

My eye, when the bark is benighted,
Sees the lamp of the lighthouse go out.
I'm the sea-bird, &c.

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »