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MAIDEN, when such a soul as thine is born,
The morning-stars their ancient music make,
And, joyful, once again their song awake,
Long silent now with melancholy scorn;
And thou, not mindless of so blest a morn,
By no least deed its harmony shalt break,
But shalt to that high chime thy footsteps take,
Through life's most darksome passes, unforlorn ;
Therefore from thy pure faith thou shalt not fall,
Therefore shalt thou be ever fair and free,
And, in thine every motion, musical
As summer air, majestic as the sea,
A mystery to those who creep and crawl
Through Time, and part it from Eternity.

IX.

My Love, I have no fear that thou shouldst die;
Albeit I ask no fairer life than this,

Whose numbering-clock is still thy gentle kiss,
While Time and Peace with hands enlocked fly,—
Yet care I not where in Eternity

We live and love, well knowing that there is
No backward step for those who feel the bliss
Of Faith as their most lofty yearnings high:
Love hath so purified my heart's strong core,
Meseems I scarcely should be startled, even,
To find, some morn, that thou hadst gone before;
Since, with thy love, this knowledge too was given,
Which each calm day doth strengthen more and more,
That they who love are but one step from Heaven.

X.

I CANNOT think that thou shouldst pass away,
Whose life to mine is an eternal law,

A piece of nature that can have no flaw,
A new and certain sunrise every day;
But, if thou art to be another ray
About the Sun of Life, and art to live
Free from all of thee that was fugitive,

The debt of Love 1 will more fully pay,

Not downcast with the thought of thee so high,

But rather raised to be a nobler man,

And more divine in my humanity,

As knowing that the waiting eyes which scan

My life are lighted by a purer being,

And ask meek, calm-browed deeds, with it agreeing.

XI.

THE HAVEN.

INTO the unruffled shelter of thy love

My bark leapt homeward from a rugged sea, And furled its sails, and dropped right peacefully Hope's anchor, quiet as a nested dove :

Thou givest me all that can the true soul move

To nobleness, a clear simplicity,

That, in the humblest man to-day, can see

Theme for high rhyme as ever poet wove,

A noiseless love that makes things common rare, And custom-weary toil with heaven rife, –

A faith that finds great meanings everywhere,
That, to the soul's high level, raiseth life,
And puts in eyes, that could but dimly see,
The calm, vast presence of Eternity.

1841.

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