Some merry jest, or tale of murder dire,
Or troubled spirit that disturbs the night,
Pausing at times to rouse the mouldering fire,
Or taste the old October brown and bright.
WESTBURY, 1799.
PORLOCK! thy verdant vale so fair to sight,
Thy lofty hills which fern and furze imbrown,
The waters that roll musically down
Thy woody glens, the traveller with delight
Recalls to memory, and the channel gray
Circling its surges in thy level bay.
Porlock! I also shall forget thee not,
Here by the unwelcome summer rain confined;
But often shall hereafter call to mind
How here, a patient prisoner, 'twas my lot.
To wear the lonely, lingering close of day,
Making my sonnet by the alehouse fire,
Whilst Idleness and Solitude inspire
Dull rhymes to pass the duller hours away.
Aug. 9, 1799.
STATELY yon vessel sails adown the tide,
To some far-distant land adventurous bound;
The sailors' busy cries from side to side,
Pealing among the echoing rocks, resound.
A patient, thoughtless, much-enduring band,
Joyful they enter on their ocean way,
With shouts exulting leave their native land,
And know no care beyond the present day.
But is there no poor mourner left behind,
Who sorrows for a child or husband there;
Who, at the howling of the midnight wind,
Will wake and tremble in her boding prayer?
So may her voice be heard, and Heaven be kind!
Go, gallant Ship, and be thy fortune fair!
WESTBURY, 1799.
O GOD! have mercy, in this dreadful hour,
On the poor mariner! In comfort here,
Safe sheltered as I am, I almost fear
The blast that rages with resistless power.
What were it now to toss upon the waves,
The maddened waves, and know no succor near;
The howling of the storm alone to hear,
And the wild sea that to the tempest raves ;
To gaze amid the horrors of the night,
And only see the billow's gleaming light;
Then, in the dread of death, to think of her,
Who, as she listens sleepless to the gale,
Puts up a silent prayer, and waxes pale?
O God! have mercy on the mariner !
WESTBURY, 1799.
SHE comes majestic with her swelling sails,
The gallant Ship: along her watery way,
Homeward she drives before the favoring gales;
Now flirting at their length the streamers play,
And now they ripple with the ruffling breeze.
Hark to the sailors' shouts! the rocks rebound,
Thundering in echoes to the joyful sound.
Long have they voyaged o'er the distant seas;
And what a heart-delight they feel at last,
So many toils, so many dangers, past,
To view the port desired, he only knows
Who on the stormy deep for many a day
Hath tossed, a-weary of his watery way,
And watched, all anxious, every wind that blows.
WESTBURY, 1799.
FAREWELL, my home, my home no longer now,
Witness of many a calm and happy day!
And thou, fair eminence, upon whose brow
Dwells the last sunshine of the evening ray,
Farewell! These eyes no longer shall pursue
The western sun beyond the farthest height,
When slowly he forsakes the fields of light.
No more the freshness of the falling dew,
Cool and delightful, here shall bathe my head,
As from this western window dear I lean,
Listening, the while I watch the placid scene,
The martins twittering underneath the shed.
Farewell, dear home, where many a day has passed
In joys whose loved remembrance long shall last!
WESTBURY, 1799.
SCENE. The Promontory of Leucadia.
THIS is the spot: 'tis here, tradition says,
That hopeless Love, from this high, towering rock,
Leaps headlong to oblivion or to death.
Oh, 'tis a giddy height! my dizzy head
Swims at the precipice! 'tis death to fall!
Lie still, thou coward heart! this is no time To shake with thy strong throbs the frame convulsed.
To die, to be at rest, oh pleasant thought!
Perchance to leap and live; the soul all still,
And the wild tempest of the passions hushed
In one deep calm; the heart, no more diseased
By the quick ague fits of hope and fear,
Quietly cold!
Presiding Powers, look down!
In vain to you I poured my earnest prayers;
In vain I sung your praises, chiefly thou,
Venus! ungrateful goddess, whom my lyre.
Hymned with such full devotion. Lesbian groves,
Witness how often, at the languid hour
Of summer twilight, to the melting song
Ye gave your choral echoes! Grecian maids,
Who hear, with downcast look and flushing cheek,
That lay of love, bear witness! and ye youths,
Who hang enraptured on the impassioned strain,
Gazing with eloquent eye, even till the heart
Sinks in the deep delirium! And ye too,
Ages unborn! bear witness ye how hard
Her fate who hymned the votive hymn in vain!
Ungrateful goddess! I have hung my lute
In yonder holy pile; my hand no more
Shall wake the melodies that failed to move
Obdurate Phaon; yet, when rumor tells
How from Leucadia Sappho cast herself,
A self-devoted victim, he may melt
Too late in pity, obstinate to love.
Oh, haunt his midnight dreams, black Nemesis, Whom,* self-conceiving in the inmost depths Of Chaos, blackest Night, long laboring, bore, When the stern Destinies, her elder brood,
And shapeless Death, from that more monstrous birth
haunt his slumbers, Nemesis!
Scorch with the fires of Phlegethon his heart,
* Οὔ τινι κοιμηθεῖσα θεὰ τέκε ΝΥΞ ἐρεβεννή. - ΗESIOD.
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