List ye ! O list!
To the lively guitar.
Trees cast a mellow shade
Over the vale,
Sweetly the serenade
Breathes in the gale,
Softly and tenderly
Over the lake,
Gaily and cheerily-
Wake! O awake!
See the light pinnace
Draws nigh to the shore,
Swiftly it glides
At the heave of the oar,
Cheerily plays
On its buoyant car,
Nearer and nearer
The lively guitar.
Now the wind rises
And ruffles the pine,
Ripples foam-crested
Like diamonds shine,
They flash, where the waters
The white pebbles lave,
In the wake of the moon,
As it crosses the wave.
Bounding from billow
To billow, the boat
Like a wild swan is seen
On the waters to float;
And the light dipping oars
Bear it smoothly along
In time to the air
Of the Gondolier's song.
And high on the stern
Stands the young and the brave,
As love-led he crosses
The star-spangled wave,
And blends with the murmur
Of water and grove
The tones of the night,
That are sacred to love.
His gold-hilted sword
At his bright belt is hung,
His mantle of silk
On his shoulder is flung,
And high waves the feather,
That dances and plays
On his cap where the buckle
And rosary blaze.
The maid from the lattice
Looks down on the lake,
To see the foam sparkle,
The bright billow break,
And to hear in his boat,
Where he shines like a star,
Her lover so tenderly
Touch his guitar.
She
opens
the lattice,
And sits in the glow
Of the moonlight and starlight,
A statue of snow ;
And she sings in a voice,
That is broken with sighs,
And she darts on her lover
The light of her eyes.
His love-speaking pantomime
Tells her his soul
How wild in that sunny clime
Hearts and eyes roll.
She waves with her white hand
Her white fazzolett,
And her burning thoughts flash
From her eyes' living jet.
The moonlight is hid
In a vapor of snow;
Her voice and his rebeck
Alternately flow;
Re-echoed they swell
From the rock on the hill;
They sing their farewell,
And the music is still.
THE GRAVES OF THE PATRIOTS.
Here rest the great and good-here they repose
After their generous toil. A sacred band,
They take their sleep together, while the year
Comes with its early flowers to deck their graves,
And gathers them again, as winter frowns.
Theirs is no vulgar sepulchre-green sods
Are all their monument, and yet it tells
A nobler history, than pillar'd piles,
Or the eternal pyramids. They need
No statue nor inscription to reveal
Their greatness. It is round them, and the joy
With which their children tread the hallowed ground
That holds their venerated bones, the peace
That smiles on all they fought for, and the wealth
That clothes the land they rescued, these, though mute,
As feeling ever is when deepest,—these
Are monuments more lasting, than the fanes
Reard to the kings and demigods of old.
Touch not the ancient elms, that bend their shade
Over their lowly graves; beneath their boughs
There is a solemn darkness, even at noon,
Suited to such as visit at the shrine
Of serious liberty. No factious voice
Call'd them unto the field of generous fame,
But the pure consecrated love of home.
No deeper feeling sways us, when it wakes
In all its greatness. It has told itself
To the astonish'd gaze of awe-struck kings,
At Marathon, at Bannockburn, and here,
Where first our patriots sent the invader back
Broken and cowed. Let these green elms be all
To tell us where they fought, and where they lie.
Their feelings were all nature, and they need
No art to make them known. They live in us,
While we are like them, simple, hardy, bold,
Worshipping nothing but our own pure hearts,
And the one universal Lord. They need
No column pointing to the heaven they sought,
To tell us of their home. The heart itself,
Left to its own free purpose, hastens there,
And there alone reposes. Let these elms
Bend their protecting shadow o'er their graves,
And build with their green roof the only fane,
Where we may gather on the hallow'd day,
That rose to them in blood, and set in glory.
Here let us meet, and while our motionless lips
Give not a sound, and all around is mute
In the deep sabbath of a heart too full
For words or tears-here let us strew the sod
With the first flowers of spring, and make to them
An offering of the plenty, Nature gives,
And they have render'd ours-perpetually.
AGAiN the infant flowers of Spring
Call thee to sport on thy rainbow wing
Spirit of Beauty! the air is bright
With the boundless flow of thy mellow light;
The woods are ready to bud and bloom,
And are weaving for Summer their quiet gloom ;
The turfed brook reflects, as it flows,
The tips of the half-unopen'd rose,
And the early bird, as he carols free,
Sings to his little love, and thee.
See how the clouds, as they fleetly pass,
Throw their shadowy veil on the darkening grass ;
And the pattering showers and stealing dews,
With their starry gems and skyey hues,
From the oozy meadow, that drinks the tide,
To the shelter'd vale on the mountain side,
Wake to a new and fresher birth
The tenderest tribes of teeming earth,
And scatter with light and dallying play
Their earliest flowers on the zephyr's way.
He comes from the mountain's piny steep,
For the long boughs bend with a silent sweep,
And his rapid steps have hurried o’er
The grassy hills to the pebbly shore;
And now, on the breast of the lonely lake,
The waves in silvery glances break,
Like a short and quickly rolling sea,
When the gale first feels its liberty,
And the flakes of foam, like coursers, run,
Rejoicing beneath the vertical sun.
He has cross'd the lake, and the forest heaves,
To the sway of his wings, its billowy leaves,
And the downy tufts of the meadow fly
In snowy clouds, as he passes by,
And softly beneath his noiseless tread
The odorous spring-grass bends its head;
And now he reaches
the woven bower,
Where he meets his own beloved flower,
And gladly his wearied limbs repose,
In the shade of the newly-opening rose.
I had a vision.--
A city lay before me, desolate,
And yet not all decay’d. A summer sun
Shone on it from a most etherial sky,
And the soft winds threw o'er it such a balm,
One would have thought it was a sepulchre,
And this the incense offer'd to the manes
Of the departed.
In the light it lay
Peacefully, as if all its thousands took
Their afternoon's repose, and soon would wake
To the loud joy of evening. There it lay,
A city of magnificent palaces,
And churches, towering more like things of heaven,
The glorious fabrics, fancy builds in clouds,
And shapes on loftiest mountains-bright their domes
Threw back the living ray, and proudly stood
Many a statue, looking like the forms
Of spirits hovering in mid air. Tall trees,
Cypress and plane, waved over many a hill
Cumber'd with ancient ruins-broken arches,
And tottering columns--vaults, where never came
The blessed beam of day, but only lamps
Shedding a funeral light, were kindled there,
And gave to the bright frescoes on the walls,
And the pale statues in their far recesses,
A dim religious awe. Rudely they lay,
Scarce marking out to the inquisitive eye
Their earliest outline. But as desolate
Slumber'd the newer city, though its walls
Were yet unbroken, and its towering domes
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