DREAD force, in whom of old we loved to see
A nursing mother, clothing with her life
The seeds of Love divine, with what sore strife
We hold or yield our thoughts of Love and thee !
Thou art not 'calm,' but restless as the ocean,
Filling with aimless toil the endless years-
Stumbling on thought and throwing off the spheres,
Churning the Universe with mindless motion.
Dull fount of joy, unhallowed source of tears,
Cold motor of our fervid faith and song,
Dead, but engendering life, love, pangs, and fears,
Thou crownedst thy wild work with foulest wrong
When first thou lightedest on a seeming goal
And darkly blundered on man's suffering soul.
BLIND Cyclops, hurling stones of destiny,
And not in fury !-working bootless ill,
In mere vacuity of mind and will-
Man's soul revolts against thy work and thee!
Slaves of a despot, conscienceless and nil,
Slaves by mad chance befooled to think them free,
We still might rise and with one heart agree
To mar the ruthless grinding of thy mill !
Dead tyrant, tho' our cries and groans pass by thee,
Man, cutting off from each new 'tree of life'
Himself, its fatal flower, could still defy thee,
In waging on thy work eternal strife,—
The races come and coming evermore,
Heaping with hecatombs thy dead-sea shore.
TO A MOTH THAT DRINKETH OF THE RIPE OCTOBER.
A MOTH belated,—sun and zephyr-kist,-
Trembling about a pale arbutus bell,
Probing to wildering depths its honeyed cell,-
A noonday thief, a downy sensualist!
Not vainly, sprite, thou drawest careless breath, Strikest ambrosia from the cool-cupped flowers, And flutterest through the soft, uncounted hours, To drop at last in unawaited death ;—
'Tis something to be glad! and those fine thrills
Which move thee, to my lip have drawn the smile
Wherewith we look on joy. Drink! drown thine ills,
If ill have any part in thee; erewhile
May the pent force-thy bounded life-set free
Fill larger sphere with equal ecstasy !
UNDER what beechen shade or silent oak
Lies the mute sylvan now mysterious Pan?
Once (when rich Péneus and Ilissus ran
Clear from their fountains) as the morning broke,
'Tis said the Satyr with Apollo spoke,
And to harmonious strife with his wild reed, Challenged the God, whose music was indeed Divine, and fit for heaven. Each played, and woke Beautiful sounds to life-deep melodies;
One blew his pastoral pipe with such nice care, That flocks and birds all answered him; and one Shook his immortal showers upon the air.
That music has ascended to the sun;
But where the other? Speak, ye dells and trees.
Look what immortal floods the sunset pours
Upon us !—Mark how still (as though in dreams
Bound) the once wild and terrible Ocean seems !
How silent are the winds! No billow roars,
But all is tranquil as Elysian shores;
The silver margin which aye runneth round
The moon-enchanted sea hath here no sound :
Even Echo speaks not on these radiant moors.
What! is the giant of the ocean dead,
Whose strength was all unmatched beneath the sun? No: he reposes. Now his toils are done, More quiet than the babbling brooks is he. So mightiest powers by deepest calms are fed, And sleep, how oft, in things that gentlest be.
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