Out of Norfolk, the Gift of My Cousin, Ann Bodham
O THAT those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine,—thy own sweet smile I see,
The same that oft in childhood solaced me;
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say,
“Grieve not, my child; chase all thy fears away!”
The meek...
Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:—
“Pipe a song about a lamb:”
So I piped with merry cheer.
“Piper, pipe that song again:”
So I piped; he wept to hear.
“Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe,
Sing thy songs of happy cheer:”
So I sung the...
I Have got a new-born sister;
I was nigh the first that kissed her.
When the nursing-woman brought her
To papa, his infant daughter,
How papa’s dear eyes did glisten!—
She will shortly be to christen;
And papa has made the offer,
I shall have the naming of her.
Now I wonder what would please her,—
Charlotte, Julia, or...
Sweet stream, that winds through yonder glade,
Apt emblem of a virtuous maid,—
Silent and chaste she steals along,
Far from the world’s gay, busy throng;
With gentle yet prevailing force,
Intent upon her destined course;
Graceful and useful all she does,
Blessing and blest where’er she goes;
Pure-bosomed as that watery glass,...
At Inversnaid, upon Loch Lomond
SWEET Highland Girl, a very shower
Of beauty is thy earthly dower!
Twice seven consenting years have shed
Their utmost bounty on thy head;
And these gray rocks, this household lawn,
These trees,—a veil just half withdrawn,—
This fall of water that doth make
A murmur near the silent lake,
This...
Ye distant spires, ye antique towers,
That crowned the watery glade,
Where grateful Science still adores
Her Henry’s holy shade;
And ye that from the stately brow
Of Windsor’s heights the expanse below
Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey,
Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers among
Wanders the hoary Thames along
His...
Where art thou gone, light-ankled Youth?
With wing at either shoulder,
And smile that never left thy mouth
Until the Hours grew colder:
Then some one seemed to whisper near
That thou and I must part;
I doubted it; I felt no fear,
No weight upon the heart.
If aught befell it, Love was by
And rolled it off...
From “Youth and Age”
VERSE, a breeze ’mid blossoms straying,
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee—
Both were mine! Life went a-maying
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young!
When I was young?—Ah, woful when!
Ah! for the change ’twixt Now and Then!
This breathing house not built with hands,
This...
Happy the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air
In his own ground.
Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire;
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
In winter, fire.
Blest, who can unconcernedly find
Hours...
Our bugles sang truce,—for the night-cloud had lowered,
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky;
And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw,
By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain;
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I...
