Oh, boatman, cease thy mellow song! Let us hear the voice of the midnight sea, Day cannot make thee half so fair, Nor the stars of eve so dear: The arms that clasp, and the breast that keeps, They tell me thou art near, And the perfect beauty of thy face In thy murmured words I hear. The lights of land have dropped below The world we leave is a tale that is told A fable, that cannot be. There is no life in the sphery dark BEDOUIN SONG. FROM the Desert I come to thee And the midnight hears my cry: I love thee, I love but thee, With a love that shall not die Till the sun grows cold, And the stars are old, And the leaves of the Judgment Look from thy window and see And I faint in thy disdain. Let the night-winds touch thy brow Of a love that shall not die And the stars are old, And the leaves of the Judgment My steps are nightly driven, By the fever in my breast, To hear from thy lattice breathed The word that shall give me rest. Open the door of thy heart, And open thy chamber door, And my kisses shall teach thy lips The love that shall fade no more Till the sun grows cold, And the stars are old, And the leaves of the Judgment Stands Saint Christopher, carven in stone, And over the wall a wandering growth And climbs around them, and holds them both Clothing the saint, from foot to beard, In glittering leaves that whisper and dance To the child on his arm the faithful saint Who plays with the world upon his palm, He smiles on either with equal grace-- Strong from the peril and the strife; For both are his own-the innocence That climbs from the heart of earth to heaven, And the virtue that greatly rises thence Through trial sent and victory given. Grow, ivy, up to his countenance ! But it cannot smile on my life as on thineLook, saint, with thy trustful, fearless glance, Where I dare not lift these eyes of mine! ALDEN. THE ANCIENT "LADY OF SORROW." HER closing eyelids mock the light; A mystic veil is drawn. The morning leaps across the plain- At eve the shadows come again: In Spring she doth her Winter wait; Her mystic tragedy. Before her pass in solemn state All shapes that come, or soon or late, What is, or shall be, or hath been, For close beneath her snow-white breast |