: Elfin land: and other poems by Ball Benjamin West - American poetry 19th century

@FreeBooksThu 08 Jun, 2023

Posted in: #FreeBooks #FreeBooksIndia #FreeBooksApp #gg

Vote Up Vote Down

In vigils lone she hears the chimes Of voices from diviner climes, And sees entranced the statures grand, That throng her lofty fatherland. Unwonted odors, strange and rare, Float round her on the midnight air, From gardens where her youth was spent, Beyond the dark blue firmament.

The fleshly walls are white and thin, Which close her yearning spirit in-- Celestial footfalls she can hear, Inaudible to grosser ear. She mourns her lot like one exiled, Her songs are filled with longings wild For home, and that serener day Which lights the angels far away.

THE SERAPHS' HOLIDAY.

MORNING.

All hail, thou blessed light of morn! At length I feel thy cheering ray-- Through all the darksome night forlorn, Yearning for thee I sleepless lay. The Roman in his palace porch, On the Parthenopean isle, To dim his red nocturnal torch, Ne'er prayed more fervently thy smile. The dripping trees in verdure drest, The rosy light, and eastern wind, Dispel the larvae, which infest The slumbers of the troubled mind.

O Power divine! my spirit keep From deeds of darkness ever clear, Lest unto me the realms of Sleep Should be beset with phantoms drear; For Conscience to the wicked is A demon-evocator pale, And summons from the soul's abyss Forms, which must make the stoutest quail.

Bear witness, purple Eremite, Who reared amid translucent seas A gorgeous palace of delight, A refuge from the Eumenides; Colossal spectres nightly strode Through portal, corridor and hall, The Sea impersonated stood, His dreaming spirit to appal.

Fronting the portals of the Sun, His lurid torches burning low, How oft amid the shadows dun He waited for the morning's glow. Bringer of pleasant thoughts, all hail! Thy touch dissolves the guilty dream. And Orcus' shapeless legions quail, Flying before thy rosy beam.

AUTUMN.

When yellowing woods let fall their sapless leaves, And, breathing softly from the mild South-west, The Indian Summer mitigates the air, Me it delights, leaving the towers of men, With devious feet, and void of fixed intent, To wander far into the country still; My path, some grassy road untrodden lone, Which leads the steps through woods of dwarfish pines, Where dwells unscared the solitary jay, And sings the cricket, sole inhabitants. In these sweet solitudes the soul becomes Tranquil as seas mid happy isles embayed; Here weary hearts a balsam for their woes, In whispering boughs and silent skies can find.

O power of Music! whence thy spell On man and brute, on soul and heart? What spirit haunts the chorded shell, Whose murmurs every passion start? The silent tenants of the sea, The brinded pard and serpent, own Thy sway--their fierceness tamed by thee, They cower and writhe about thy throne.

Thy lordly breath to war can yield A glory wild, a nameless charm; The sworded ranks, the embattled field Thou fill'st with bosoms high and warm; The gorgeous palaces of old Thy magic numbers cause to rise, And faces, which the valley's mould Has hidden long from weeping eyes.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

Login to post a comment!