Toss the light ball-bestride the stick, (I knew so many cakes would make him sick!) With fancies buoyant as the thistle down, Prompting the face grotesque, and antic brisk, With many a lamb-like frisk, (He's got the scissors, snipping at your gown.) Thou pretty opening rose ! (Go to your mother, child, and wipe your nose!) Balmy, and breathing music like the south, (He really brings my heart into my mouth!) Fresh as the morn, and brilliant as its star, (I wish that window had an iron bar!) Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the dove(I'll tell you what, my love, I cannot write unless he's sent above!) I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER I remember, I remember The house where I was born- I remember, I remember The roses-red and white; I remember, I remember Where I was used to swing; And thought the air must rush as fresh My spirit flew in feathers then, That is so heavy now, And summer pools could hardly cool The fever on my brow! I remember, I remember The fir-trees dark and high; I used to think their slender tops It was a childish ignorance, To know I'm farther off from heaven THE SONG OF THE SHIRT. With fingers weary and worn, In poverty, hunger, and dirt, And still, with a voice of dolorous pitch, "Work! work! work! While the cock is crowing aloof! Till the stars shine through the roof! Along with the barbarous Turk, Where woman has never a soul to save, If THIS is Christian work! "Work-work-work! Till the brain begins to swim; Till the eyes are heavy and dim! "Oh! men with sisters dear! Oh! men with mothers and wives! In poverty, hunger, and dirt, "Work-work-work! From weary chime to chime; Work-work-work! As prisoners work for crime! Band, and gusset, and seam, Seam, and gusset, and band, Till the heart is sick and the brain benumb'd, As well as the weary hand! "Work-work-work, In the dull December light; And work-work-work! When the weather is warm and bright: While underneath the eaves The brooding swallows cling, As if to show me their sunny backs, "Oh! but to breathe the breath Of the cowslip and primrose sweet; And the grass beneath my feet: To feel as I used to feel, Before I knew the woes of want, "Oh! but for one short hour! No blessed leisure for love or hope, A little weeping would ease my heart- My tears must stop, for every drop With fingers weary and worn, In poverty, hunger, and dirt; And still with a voice of dolorous pitch- THE LADY'S DREAM. The lady lay in her bed, Her couch so warm and soft, But her sleep was restless and broken still; For, turning oft and oft From side to side, she mutter'd and moan'd, And toss'd her arms aloft. At last she started up, And gazed on the vacant air Some dreadful phantom there And then in the pillow she buried her face The very curtain shook, Her terror was so extreme, And the light that fell on the broider'd quilt Kept a tremulous gleam; And her voice was hollow, and shook as she cried, "Oh me! that awful dream! "That weary, weary walk, In the churchyard's dismal ground! And those horrible things, with shady wings, Death, death, and nothing but death, "And oh! those maidens young, Who wrought in that dreary room, With figures drooping and spectres thin, And the voice that cried, For the pomp of pride "For the pomp and pleasures of pride, And only to earn a home, at last, "And still the coffins came, With their sorrowful trains and slow; A sad and sickening show; From grief exempt, I never had dreamt "Of the hearts that daily break, "For the blind and the cripple were there, The naked, alas, that I might have clad, The famish'd I might have fed! "The sorrow I might have soothed, And the unregarded tears! For many a thronging shape was there, "Each pleading look, that, long ago, Woe, woe for me if the past should be "No need of sulphurous lake, But only that crowd of humankind In everlasting retrospect Will wring my sinful soul! "Alas! I have walk'd through life Nay, helping to trample my fellow-worm, "I drank the richest draughts, But I never remember'd the wretched ones "I dress'd as the nobles dress, With silk and satin, and costly furs, But I never remember'd the naked limbs "The wounds I might have heal'd! And yet it never was in my soul But evil is wrought by want of thought She clasp'd her fervent hands, And the tears began to stream; And yet, oh yet, that many a dame |