LINES. THE cold earth slept below; With a chilling sound, From caves of ice and fields of snow, The breath of night like death did flow The wintry hedge was black, The green grass was not seen, The birds did rest On the bare thorn's breast, Whose roots, beside the pathway track, Had bound their folds o'er many a crack Which the frost had made between. Thine eyes glowed in the glare Of the moon's dying light; As a fen-fire's beam, On a sluggish stream, Gleams dimly-so the moon shone there, And it yellowed the strings of thy tangled hair That shook in the wind of night. The moon made thy lips pale, beloved; The wind made thy bosom chill; The night did shed On thy dear head Its frozen dew, and thou didst lie Where the bitter breath of the naked sky November, 1815. DEATH. DEATH is here and death is there, All around, within, beneath, Above is death-and we are death. Death has set his mark and seal On all we are and all we feel, On all we know and all we fear, 茶 First our pleasures die-and then Our hopes, and then our fears—and when These are dead, the debt is due, Dust claims dust-and we die too. All things that we love and cherish, Such is our rude mortal lot, ΤΟ WHEN passion's trance is overpast, It were enough to feel, to see And dream the rest-and burn and be The secret food of fires unseen, Couldst thou but be as thou hast been. After the slumber of the year And sky and sea, but two, which move, PASSAGE OF THE APENNINES. LISTEN, listen, Mary mine, To the whisper of the Apennine, It bursts on the roof like the thunder's roar, Or like the sea on a northern shore, Heard in its raging ebb and flow By the captives pent in the cave below. Is a mighty mountain dim and grey, On the dim starlight then is spread, And the Apennine walks abroad with the storm. May 4th, 1818. |