The Death-Wake Part 6

We found them,--like twin stars, alone, In brightness and in feeling; We left them,--and the curse was on Their beauty stealing.

They rest in quiet, where they are: Their lifetime is the story Of some fair flower--some silver star, Faded in glory!

POEMS

THE IRIS

A pale and broken Iris in the mirror Of a gray cloud,--as gray as death, Slow sailing in the breath Of thunder! Like a child, that lies in terror Through the dark night, an Iris fair Trembled midway in air.

The blending of its elfin hues Was as the pure enamel on The early morning dews; And gloriously they shone, Waving everyone his wing, Like a young aerial thing!

That Iris came Over the sh.e.l.ls of gold, beside The blue and waveless tide; Its girdle, of resplendent flame, Met sh.o.r.e and sea, afar, Like angel that shall stand On flood and land, Crown'd with a meteor star.

The sea-bird, from her snowy stone, Beheld it floating on, Like a bride that bent her way To the altar, standing lone, In some cathedral gray.

The melancholy wave Started at the cry she gave, Hailing the lovely child Of the immortal sun,-- A tender and a tearful one, Bounding away, with footsteps wild!

Old Neptune on his silver bed The dazzling image threw; It laid like sunbeam on the dew, Its young tress-waving head.

The G.o.d upon the shadow gazed, And silently upraised A gentle wave, that came and kiss'd Fair Iris in her holy rest.

Her pearly brow grew pale: It felt the sinful fire, And from her queenly tiar She drew the veil.

The sun-wing'd steeds her sacred car Wheel'd to her throne of star.

TO A SPIRIT

Spirit! in deathless halo zoned, A chain of stars with wings of diamond,-- Is music blended into thee With holy light and immortality?

For, as thy shape of glory swept Through seas of darkness, magic breathings fell Around it, like the notes that slept In the wild caverns of a silver sh.e.l.l.

Thou camest, as a lightning spring Through chasms of horrid cloud, on scathless wing; Old Chaos round him, like a tiar, Swathed the long rush of immaterial fire; As thou, descending from afar, Wast canopied with living arch of light, Pale pillars of immortal star, Burst through the curtains of the moonless night.

Phantom of wonder! over thee, Trembles the shadow of the Deity; For face to face, on lifted throne, Thou gazest to the glory-shrouded One, Where highest in the azure height Of universe, eternally he turns Myriads of worlds; with blaze of light Filling the hollow of their golden urns.

Why comest thou, with feelings bound On thy birth-sh.o.r.e, the long unenter'd ground?

To visit where thy being first, Through the pale sh.e.l.l of embryo nothing, burst?

Or, on celestial errand bent, To win to faith a sin enraptured son, And point the angel lineament Of mercy on a cross,--the Bleeding One?

Spirit! I breathe no sad adieu: The altars where thou bendest never knew Sigh, tear, or sorrow, and the night No chariot drives behind the wheel of light; Where every seraph is a sun, And every soul an everlasting star.-- Go to thy home, thou peerless one!

Where glory and the Great Immortal are!

HER, A STATUE

Her life is in the marble! yet a fall Of sleep lies on the heart's fair a.r.s.enal, Like new shower'd snow. You hear no whisper through Those love-divided lips; no pearly dew Trembles on her pale orbs, that seem to be Bent on a dream of immortality!

She sleeps: her life is sleep,--a holy rest!

Like that of wing-borne cloud, that, in the west Laves his aerial image, till afar The sunlight leaves him, melting into star.

Did Phidias from her brow the veil remove, Uncurtaining the peerless queen of love?

The fluent stone in marble waves recoil'd, Touch'd by his hand, and left the wondrous child, A Venus of the foam! How softly fair The dove-like pa.s.sion on the sacred air Floats round her, nesting in her wreathed hair, That tells, though shadeless, of its auburn hue, Bathed in a h.o.a.r of diamond-dropping dew!

How beautiful!--Was this not one of eld, That Chaos on his boundless bosom held, Till Earth came forward in a rush of storm, Closing his ribs upon her wingless form?

How beautiful!--The very lips do speak Of love, and bid us worship: the pale cheek Seems blushing through the marble--through the snow!

And the undrap'ried bosom feels a flow Of fever on its brightness; every vein At the blue pulse swells softly, like a chain Of gentle hills. I would not fling a wreath Of jewels on that brow, to flash beneath Those queenly tresses; for itself is more Than sea-born pearl of some Elysian sh.o.r.e!

Such, with a heart like woman! I would cast Life at her foot, and, as she glided past, Would bid her trample on the slavish thing-- Tell her, I'd rather feel me withering Under her step, than be unknown for aye: And, when her pride had crush'd me, she might see A love-wing'd spirit glide in glory by Striking the tent of its mortality!

TO A STORM-STAID BIRD

Trembler! a month is past, and thou Wert singing on the thorn, And shaking dew-drops from the bough In the golden haze of morn!

My heart was just as thou, as light-- As loving of the breeze, That kiss'd thee in its elfin flight, Through the green acacia trees.

And now the winter snow-flakes lie All on thy widow'd wing; Trembler! methinks I hear thee sigh For the silver days of spring.

But shake thy plume--the world is free Before thee--warbler, fly!

Blest by a sunbeam and by me, Bird of my heart! good-bye!

THE WOLF-DROVE

No night-star in the welkin blue! no moonshade round the trees That grew down to the sea-swept foot of the ancient Pyrenees!

The cold gray mantle of the mist, along the shoulders cast Of those wild mountains, to and fro, hung waving in the blast.

A snow-crown rising on their brows, in royalty they stood, As if they vice-reign'd on a throne of winter solitude; Those hills that rose far upward, till in majesty they bent Their world's great eye-orb on her own immortal lineament!

The howl, the long deep howl was heard, the rushing like a wave Of the wolf train from their forest haunt, in some old mountain cave; Like a sea-wave, when the wind is horsed behind its foamy crest, And it lifts upon the sh.e.l.l-built sh.o.r.e, its azure-spotted breast.

They came with war-whoop, following each other, like a thread, Through the long labyrinth of trees, in sunless archway spread; Their gnarled trunks in shadowy lines rose dimly, few by few, Mail'd in their mossy armouring,--a pathless avenue!

In sooth, there was a shepherd girl by her aged father's side; He gazed upon her deep dark eyes, in glory and in pride; The mother's soul was living there,--the image full and wild, Of one he loved--of one no more, was beaming in her child.

And she was at her father's side, her raven tresses felt Upon his care-worn cheek, as gay and joyfully she knelt, Kissing the old man's tears away, by the embers burning faint, While she sung the holy aves, and a vesper to her saint.

"Now bar the breezy lattice, love!--but hist! how fares the night?