In Burmah
SLEEP, love, sleep!
The dusty day is done.
Lo! from afar the freshening breezes sweep
Wide over groves of balm,
Down from the towering palm,
In at the open casement cooling run,
And round thy lowly bed,
Thy bed of pain,
Bathing thy patient head,
Like grateful showers of rain,
They come;
...
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-
To sleep I give myself away,
Unclasp the fetters of the mind,
Forget the sorrows of the day,
The burdens of the heart unbind.With empty sail this tired bark
Drifts out upon the sea of rest,
While all the shore behind grows dark
And silence reigns from east to west.At last awakes the hidden breeze
That bears me to the... -
Two seas, amid the night,
In the moonshine roll and sparkle—
Now spread in the silver light,
Now sadden, and wail, and darkle.The one has a billowy motion,
And from land to land it gleams;
The other is sleep’s wide ocean,
And its glimmering waves are dreams.The one, with murmur and roar,
Bears fleets around... -
Beyond the sunset and the amber sea
To the lone depths of ether, cold and bare,
Thy influence, soul of all tranquillity,
Hallows the earth and awes the reverent air;
Yon laughing rivulet quells its silvery tune;
The pines, like priestly watchers tall and grim,
Stand mute against the pensive twilight dim,
Breathless to hail the... -
(In Memoriam, May 30)
I.
TOLL the slow bell,
Toll the low bell,
Toll, toll,
Make dole
For them that wrought so well.
Come, come,
With muffled drum
And wailing lorn
Of dolorous horn;
The solemn measure slow
Toll and beat and blow;
Put out all glories that adorn
The sweet, unheeding morn... -
This bronze doth keep the very form and mould
Of our great martyr’s face. Yes, this is he:
That brow all wisdom, all benignity;
That human, humorous mouth; those cheeks that hold
Like some harsh landscape all the summer’s gold;
That spirit fit for sorrow, as the sea
For storms to beat on; the lone agony
Those silent, patient... -
Look on this cast, and know the hand
That bore a nation in its hold:
From this mute witness understand
What Lincoln was,—how large of mouldThe man who sped the woodman’s team,
And deepest sunk the ploughman’s share,
And pushed the laden raft astream,
Of fate before him unaware.This was the hand that knew to swing...
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From the Harvard Commemoration Ode, July 21, 1865
LIFE may be given in many ways,
And loyalty to Truth be sealed
As bravely in the closet as the field,
So bountiful is Fate;
But then to stand beside her,
When craven churls deride her,
To front a line in arms and not to yield,
This shows, methinks, God’s plan... -
From “Idyls of the King”
Dedication
THESE to His Memory—since he held them dear,
Perchance as finding there unconsciously
Some image of himself—I dedicate,
I dedicate, I consecrate with tears—
These Idyls.
And indeed He seems to me
Scarce other than my own ideal knight,
“Who reverenced his conscience as his king;... -
[Written at the request of the Mantuans for the Nineteenth Centenary of Virgil’s death, B.C. 19.]
I.
ROMAN Virgil, thou that singest
Ilion’s lofty temples robed in fire,
Ilion falling, Rome arising,
wars, and filial faith, and Dido’s pyre;II.
Landscape-lover, lord of language
more than he that sang the Works and...