To poor sick people, richer in His eyes
Who ransomed us, and haler too than I,
And treat their loathsome hurts and heal mine own,
And so wear out in almsdeed and in prayer
The sombre close of that voluptuous day,
Which wrought the ruin of my lord the King."
She said they took her to themselves; and she Still hoping, fearing, 'Is it yet too late?"
Dwelt with them, till in time their Abbess died,
Then she, for her good deeds and her pure life,
And for the power of ministration in her,
And likewise for the high rank she had borne,
Was chosen Abbess, there, an Abbess, lived
For three brief years, and there, an Abbess, past
To where beyond these voices there is peace.
WRITTEN AT AMPTON, SUFFOLK.
ELCOME, stern Winter, though thy brows are
bound
With no fresh flowers, and ditties none thou hast
But the wild music of the sweeping blast;
Welcome this chilly wind that snatches round
The brown leaves in quaint eddies; we have long
Panted in wearying heat; skies always bright,
And dull return of never-clouded light,
Sort not with hearts that gather food for song.
Rather, dear Winter, I would forth with thee,
Watching thee disattire the earth; and roam
On the bleak heaths that stretch about my home,
Till round the flat horizon I can see
The purple frost-belt; then to fireside-chair,
And sweetest labor of poetic care.
WRITTEN AT AMPTON, SUFFOLK, JANUARY, 1838.
NCE more I stray among this wilderness
Of ancient trees, and through the rustling fern, Golden and sere, brush forward; at each turn Meeting fresh avenues in winter dress
Of long gray moss, or yellow lichen bright;
While the long lines of intercepted shade,
Spread into distance through the turfy glade,
Checkered with rosy paths of evening light.
Here first I learned to tune my youthful thoughts
To themes of blessed import: woods and sky,
And waters, as they rushed or slumbered by,
For my poetic soul refreshment brought;
And now within me rise, unbidden long,
Fresh springs of life, fresh themes of earnest song.
the proud Thames of trade the busy mart;
Arun, to thee will other praise belong:
Dear to the lover's and the mourner's heart,
And ever sacred to the sons of song.
Thy banks romantic hopeless Love shall seek,
Where o'er the rocks the mantling bind-weed flaunts;
And Sorrow's drooping form and faded cheek
Choose on thy willowed shore her lonely haunts.
Banks, which inspired thy Otway's plaintive strain!
Wilds, whose lorn echoes learned the deeper tone
Of Collins, powerful shade! yet once again
Another poet, Hayley, is thine own.
Thy classic stream again shall hear a lay
Bright as its waves and various as its way.
ON thy wild banks, by frequent torrents worn,
No glittering fanes or marble domes appear:
Yet shall the weeping muse thy course adorn,
And still to her thy rustic waves be dear.
For with the infant Otway lingering here
Of early woes she bade her votary dream,
While thy low murmurs soothed his pensive ear;
And still the poet consecrates the stream.
Beneath the oak and birch that fringe thy side,
The first-born violets of the year shall spring;
And in thy hazels, bending o'er the tide,
The earliest nightingales delight to sing:
While kindred spirits pitying shall relate
Thy Otway's sorrows, and lament his fate.
WRITTEN ON THE BANKS OF THE ARUN.
HEN latest autumn spreads her evening veil,
And the gray mists from these dim waves arise,
I love to listen to the hollow sighs
Through the half leafless wood that breathes the gale.
For at such hours the shadowy phantom pale,
Oft seems to fleet before the poet's eyes;
Strange sounds are heard, and mournful melodies
As of night-wanderers who their woes bewail.
Here by his native stream, at such an hour,
Pity's own Otway I methinks could meet
And hear his deep sighs swell the saddened wind!
O Melancholy, such thy magic power
That to the soul these dreams are often sweet
And soothe the pensive visionary mind.
on, sweet river! like his verse
Who lies beneath this marble hearse,
Nor wait beside the churchyard wall
For him who cannot hear thy call.
Thy playmate once; I see him now
A boy with sunshine on his brow,
And hear in Stratford's quiet street
The patter of his little feet.
I see him by thy shallow edge
Wading knee-deep amid the sedge;
And lost in thought, as if thy stream
Were the swift river of a dream.
He wonders whitherward it flows;
And fain would follow where it goes,
To the wide world, that shall erelong
Be filled with his melodious song.
Flow on, fair stream! That dream is o'er;
He stands upon another shore ;
A vaster river near him flows,
And still he follows where it goes.
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