Yet Love hath echoes truer far
And far more sweet
Than e'er, beneath the moonlight's star, Of horn or lute or soft guitar
'Tis when the sigh,-in youth sincere
The sigh that's breathed for one to hear- Is by that one, that only Dear
Breathed back again.
AT THE MID HOUR OF NIGHT
Ar the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, I fly To the lone vale we loved, when life shone warm in thine eye; And I think oft, if spirits can steal from the regions of air To revisit past scenes of delight, thou wilt come to me there And tell me our love is remember'd, even in the sky!
Then I sing the wild song it once was rapture to hear When our voices, commingling, breathed like one on the ear; And as Echo far off through the vale my sad orison rolls, I think, O my Love! 'tis thy voice, from the Kingdom of Souls
Faintly answering still the notes that once were so dear.
CHARLES WOLFE
[1791-1823]
THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE AT CORUNNA Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corpse to the rampart we hurried; Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot O'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night, The sods with our bayonets turning; By the struggling moonbeam's misty light And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said, And we spoke not a word of sorrow; But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead, And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, And we far away on the billow!
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,- But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring: And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory.
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY [1792-1822]
FROM the forests and highlands
We come, we come;
From the river-girt islands,
Where loud waves are dumb, Listening to my sweet pipings. The wind in the reeds and the rushes, The bees on the bells of thyme, The birds on the myrtle bushes, The cicale above in the lime,
And the lizards below in the grass, Were as silent as ever old Tmolus was, Listening to my sweet pipings.
Liquid Peneus was flowing, And all dark Tempe lay In Pelion's shadow, outgrowing The light of the dying day, Speeded by my sweet pipings.
The Sileni and Sylvans and Fauns,
And the Nymphs of the woods and waves, To the edge of the moist river-lawns, And the brink of the dewy caves,
And all that did then attend and follow, Were silent with love, as you now, Apollo, With envy of my sweet pipings.
I sang of the dancing stars,
I sang of the dædal earth,
And of heaven, and the giant wars, And love, and death, and birth. And then I changed my pipings- Singing how down the vale of Manalus
I pursued a maiden, and clasp'd a reed: Gods and men, we are all deluded thus;
We buried him darkly at dead of night, The sods with our bayonets turning; By the struggling moonbeam's misty light And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said, And we spoke not a word of sorrow; But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead, And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, And we far away on the billow!
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,— But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half of our heavy task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring: And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory.
FROM the forests and highlands
We come, we come;
From the river-girt islands,
Where loud waves are dumb, Listening to my sweet pipings. The wind in the reeds and the rushes, The bees on the bells of thyme, The birds on the myrtle bushes, The cicale above in the lime,
And the lizards below in the grass, Were as silent as ever old Tmolus was, Listening to my sweet pipings.
Liquid Peneus was flowing, And all dark Tempe lay In Pelion's shadow, outgrowing The light of the dying day, Speeded by my sweet pipings.
The Sileni and Sylvans and Fauns,
And the Nymphs of the woods and waves, To the edge of the moist river-lawns, And the brink of the dewy caves,
And all that did then attend and follow, Were silent with love, as you now, Apollo, With envy of my sweet pipings.
I sang of the dancing stars,
I sang of the dædal earth,
And of heaven, and the giant wars, And love, and death, and birth. And then I changed my pipings- Singing how down the vale of Mænalus I pursued a maiden, and clasp'd a reed: Gods and men, we are all deluded thus;
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