XVIII. FULL many noble friends my soul hath known, Have sown such beauty as can never die ; The joys I shared with them, the unlaced hours Of laughing thoughts, that came and went like flowers, Or higher argument, Apollo's own: Those listening eyes that gave nobility To humblest verses writ and read for love, Those burning words of high democracy, Those doubts that through the vague abyss would rove And lean o'er chasms that took away the breath,When I forget them, may it be in death! XIX. How oft do I live o'er that blissful time When first I found thy love within my breast, Born a full flower, more fair than all the rest, For Love hath made it now wise Nature's child, And from her arms it cannot be exiled. XX. SLOW-OPENING flower of the summer morn, Deep thoughtfulness of never-wrinkled blue, For the lone moon and stars to wander through, – Sunset, and all the wreaths by Nature worn, And momently thrown by for beauties new, My heart grows fragrant while on you I look, Pained with her mighty hum the calm, blue heaven: Shall the dull stone pay grateful orisons, And we till noonday bar the splendor out, And be content, though clad with angel-wings, Brimming the chalice of each full-blown hope, Never had poets such high call before, Never can poets hope for higher one, And, if they be but faithful to their trust, Earth will remember them with love and joy, For he who settles Freedom's principles Writes the death-warrant of all tyranny; Who speaks the truth stabs Falsehood to the heart, And his mere word makes despots tremble more XXII. THE SAME, CONTINUED. ONCE hardly in a cycle blossometh A flower-like soul ripe with the seeds of song, With starry words, that shoot prevailing light Soothing her bitter fetters as she can, At the next beating of the infinite Heart. |