It dreams a rest, if not more deep,
More grateful than this marble sleep;
It hears a voice within it tell:
Calm's not life's crown, though calm is well. 'Tis all perhaps which man acquires,
But 'tis not what our youth desires.
LAUGH, my friends, and without blame
Lightly quit what lightly came;
Rich to-morrow as to-day,
Spend as madly as you may 1
I, with little land to stir,
Am the exacter labourer.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Once I said: 'A face is gone
If too hotly mused upon;
And our best impressions are
Those that do themselves repair.'
Many a face I so let flee,
Ah! is faded utterly.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Marguerite says: 'As last year went,
So the coming year 'll be spent ;
Some day next year, I shall be,
Entering heedless, kiss'd by thee.'
Ah, I hope!—yet, once away,
What may chain us, who can say ?
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory
Paint that lilac kerchief, bound
Her soft face, her hair around;
Tied under the archest chin
Mockery ever ambush'd in.
Let the fluttering fringes streak
All her pale, sweet-rounded cheek.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Paint that figure's pliant grace
As she toward me lean'd her face,
Half refused and half resign'd,
Murmuring: Art thou still unkind?'
Many a broken promise then
Was new made—to break again.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
Paint those eyes, so blue, so kind,
Eager tell-tales of her mind;
Paint, with their impetuous stress
Of enquiring tenderness,
Those frank eyes, where deep doth be
An angelic gravity.
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
What, my friends, these feeble lines
Shew, you say, my love declines?
To paint ill as I have done,
Proves forgetfulness begun?
Time's gay minions, pleased you see,
Time, your master, governs me;
Pleased, you mock the fruitless cry:
'Quick, thy tablets, Memory!'
Ah, too true! Time's current strong
Leaves us true to nothing long.
Yet, if little stays with man,
Ah, retain we all we can!
If the clear impression dies,
Ah, the dim remembrance prize!
Ere the parting hour go by,
Quick, thy tablets, Memory!
In the cedar-shadow sleeping, Where cool grass and fragrant glooms Late at eve had lured me, creeping From your darken'd palace rooms— I, who in your train at morning Stroll'd and sang with joyful mind, Heard, in slumber, sounds of warning; Saw the hoarse boughs labour in the wind.
Who are they, O pensive Graces,
-For I dream'd they wore your forms-
Who on shores and sea-wash'd places
Scoop the shelves and fret the storms?
Who, when ships are that way tending,
Troop across the flushing sands,
To all reefs and narrows wending,
With blown tresses, and with beckoning hands?
Yet I see, the howling levels
Of the deep are not your lair;
And your tragic-vaunted revels
Are less lonely than they were.
Like those Kings with treasure steering
From the jewell'd lands of dawn,
Troops, with gold and gifts, appearing,
Stream all day through your enchanted lawn.
And we too, from upland valleys,
Where some Muse with half-curved frown
Leans her ear to your mad sallies
Which the charm'd winds never drown;
By faint music guided, ranging
The scared glens, we wander'd on,
Left our awful laurels hanging,
And came heap'd with myrtles to your throne.
From the dragon-warder'd fountains
Where the springs of knowledge are,
From the watchers on the mountains,
And the bright and morning star;
We are exiles, we are falling,
We have lost them at your call-
O ye false ones, at your calling
Seeking ceiled chambers and a palace-hall!
Are the accents of your luring
More melodious than of yore?
Are those frail forms more enduring
Than the charms Ulysses bore?
That we sought you with rejoicings,
Till at evening we descry
At a pause of Siren voicings.
These vext branches and this howling sky? .
Oh, your pardon! The uncouthness
Of that primal age is gone,
And the skin of dazzling smoothness
Screens not now a heart of stone.
Love has flush'd those cruel faces;
And those slacken'd arms forgo
The delight of death-embraces,
And yon whitening bone-mounds do not grow.
'Ah,' you say; 'the large appearance
Of man's labour is but vain,
And we plead as staunch adherence
Due to pleasure as to pain.'
Pointing to earth's careworn creatures,
'Come,' you murmur with a sigh:
'Ah! we own diviner features,
Loftier bearing, and a prouder eye.
'Come,' you say, 'the hours were dreary;
Life without love does but fade;
Vain it wastes, and we grew weary
In the slumbrous cedarn shade.
Round our hearts with long caresses,
With low sighings, Silence stole,
And her load of steaming tresses
Weigh'd, like Ossa, on the aery soul.
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