A Poem, Harvard College Commencement
HARVARD COLLEGE COMMENCEMENT AUGUST 26, 1829
As the proud champion in the days or old
Ere the deep thunders for the onset rolled
Turned to the ranks where beauty's bright array
Rose like the crescent on the brow of day
And sought through all the glowing forms to trace
His own fair lady in the crowded place
To ask the favour of one gentle sigh —
To claim one tribute from her glancing eye
So would we turn, in anxious hope to find
Some pitying symptoms from the fair and kind
And ask for mercy as we humbly bow
Down at their feet our laurel cinctured brow.
— And this dread moment is at last our own
And we are left unpitied and alone
With beating heart and trembling hands to dare
The idle glance — the stern unwavering stare
The sneers of youth — the darker trown of age
The schoolboy critic and the solemn sage
The pensive miss who listens as she sighs
For " golden ringlets " and for " sunny skies "
The nameless being whose existence fills
What would be vacuum in his faultless gills
The sober people that consult the time
And think of dinner in despite of rhyme
And those that crowd around the sacred door
To see the place they never saw before.
— Fair creatures kindling with a starlike glow
The hallowed precincts of the lofty row
Since ye are straining all your eyes to scan
The curves and angles of our outer man
And we all quivering with disdain must feel
Your curious looks that creep from crown to heel
Since fate's dark pleasure has decreed to day
That you must hear what we shall choose to say
To make at once the mutual compact fair
We turn to you and find our subject there.
— We be your subject lisps the miss of ten
Why poets are as impudent as men!
We be your subject! cries the shrinking belle
This horrid bonnet! but the gown looks well —
Pray did he think we wanted to be seen
In Cupid's name what does the creature mean?
The married lady hints that she allows
No such remarks from her well managed spouse
Or whispers glancing at her wedding ring
I wish my husband had said such a thing.
— Bid all your fans their slender veils expand
Knit the fair brow and clench the little hand
The timid miss is happy ere she flies
To light her taper in your flashing eyes.
— There sits the wife — and though a wife may seem
A curious subject for the poet's dream
Yet there is something in that gentle name
That wakes the slumbers of the soul to flame.
When the last angel winged his silent way
From earth's dark shadows to a brighter day
Yet erring man of heavenly forms bereft
Could thank his God that one at least was left.
O had our mother like the modern Eves
Robed her fair brow in those luxuriant sleeves
Then had poor Adam like their husbands known
How hard his fortune who is all alone
And walked in sorrow by his blooming bride
Some twenty paces from the lady's side.
— On yonder seat — but Fancy says beware
Nor wake the vengeance that is slumbering there
By all your prospects, as you hope to claim
A lasting record on the page of fame
Tread not too rashly on the sacred ground
Where the soft votary of the muse is found.
The time has been when nature's simple child
Was free and fearless in his forest wild
His lovely savage in her native grace
Asked not the aid of ribbons or of lace
She read no novels poems or reviews
And men were happy in the want of blues.
The times have changed — the steps or womankind
Are first and foremost in the march of mind
The housewife's manual sleeps upon the shelves
They read — they write — they criticise themselves.
Turn for a moment to that youthful fair
With dovelike aspect and with gentle air
Who softly flutters with her little fan
And looks as much like fainting as she can.
If you have seen — and by a victim's tears
The sight is common in these latter years
A fair haired maiden who forever sought
For what she called " a sweet poetic thought "
Who wrote in lines that lingled at their ends
And kept an album for her private friends
Then gentle hearer you indeed have seen
The female monster that our verses mean.
Trust not the light of her insidious smile
Tis but the splendour of your funeral pile
Though all the graces in her pout appear
That pink leaved album follows in the rear.
— Nor there alone the fleeting muse require
To waste the glimmer of her waning fire
While lips like thine celestial beauty claim
The worthless offering of her feeble flame.
Fairest of beings, if thy melting eyes
Have caught the azure of the summer skies
Or the pure spirit send its flashes through
The kindling shadows of a darker hue
If oer thy forehead parts the raven fold
Or the bright tresses float in liquid gold
We own thy influence and we bow to thee
The atheist's God — the despot of the free
We coldly bend at many a prouder throne
But the heart's homage — it is all thine own.
— Our time is past — we may not stay to raise
The idle paeans of unneeded praise
If the poor graduate's ever frugal board
Shall soon or late so strange a thing afford
One classic tribute shall at least be thine —
The deepest bumper of the brightest wine —
As the proud champion in the days or old
Ere the deep thunders for the onset rolled
Turned to the ranks where beauty's bright array
Rose like the crescent on the brow of day
And sought through all the glowing forms to trace
His own fair lady in the crowded place
To ask the favour of one gentle sigh —
To claim one tribute from her glancing eye
So would we turn, in anxious hope to find
Some pitying symptoms from the fair and kind
And ask for mercy as we humbly bow
Down at their feet our laurel cinctured brow.
— And this dread moment is at last our own
And we are left unpitied and alone
With beating heart and trembling hands to dare
The idle glance — the stern unwavering stare
The sneers of youth — the darker trown of age
The schoolboy critic and the solemn sage
The pensive miss who listens as she sighs
For " golden ringlets " and for " sunny skies "
The nameless being whose existence fills
What would be vacuum in his faultless gills
The sober people that consult the time
And think of dinner in despite of rhyme
And those that crowd around the sacred door
To see the place they never saw before.
— Fair creatures kindling with a starlike glow
The hallowed precincts of the lofty row
Since ye are straining all your eyes to scan
The curves and angles of our outer man
And we all quivering with disdain must feel
Your curious looks that creep from crown to heel
Since fate's dark pleasure has decreed to day
That you must hear what we shall choose to say
To make at once the mutual compact fair
We turn to you and find our subject there.
— We be your subject lisps the miss of ten
Why poets are as impudent as men!
We be your subject! cries the shrinking belle
This horrid bonnet! but the gown looks well —
Pray did he think we wanted to be seen
In Cupid's name what does the creature mean?
The married lady hints that she allows
No such remarks from her well managed spouse
Or whispers glancing at her wedding ring
I wish my husband had said such a thing.
— Bid all your fans their slender veils expand
Knit the fair brow and clench the little hand
The timid miss is happy ere she flies
To light her taper in your flashing eyes.
— There sits the wife — and though a wife may seem
A curious subject for the poet's dream
Yet there is something in that gentle name
That wakes the slumbers of the soul to flame.
When the last angel winged his silent way
From earth's dark shadows to a brighter day
Yet erring man of heavenly forms bereft
Could thank his God that one at least was left.
O had our mother like the modern Eves
Robed her fair brow in those luxuriant sleeves
Then had poor Adam like their husbands known
How hard his fortune who is all alone
And walked in sorrow by his blooming bride
Some twenty paces from the lady's side.
— On yonder seat — but Fancy says beware
Nor wake the vengeance that is slumbering there
By all your prospects, as you hope to claim
A lasting record on the page of fame
Tread not too rashly on the sacred ground
Where the soft votary of the muse is found.
The time has been when nature's simple child
Was free and fearless in his forest wild
His lovely savage in her native grace
Asked not the aid of ribbons or of lace
She read no novels poems or reviews
And men were happy in the want of blues.
The times have changed — the steps or womankind
Are first and foremost in the march of mind
The housewife's manual sleeps upon the shelves
They read — they write — they criticise themselves.
Turn for a moment to that youthful fair
With dovelike aspect and with gentle air
Who softly flutters with her little fan
And looks as much like fainting as she can.
If you have seen — and by a victim's tears
The sight is common in these latter years
A fair haired maiden who forever sought
For what she called " a sweet poetic thought "
Who wrote in lines that lingled at their ends
And kept an album for her private friends
Then gentle hearer you indeed have seen
The female monster that our verses mean.
Trust not the light of her insidious smile
Tis but the splendour of your funeral pile
Though all the graces in her pout appear
That pink leaved album follows in the rear.
— Nor there alone the fleeting muse require
To waste the glimmer of her waning fire
While lips like thine celestial beauty claim
The worthless offering of her feeble flame.
Fairest of beings, if thy melting eyes
Have caught the azure of the summer skies
Or the pure spirit send its flashes through
The kindling shadows of a darker hue
If oer thy forehead parts the raven fold
Or the bright tresses float in liquid gold
We own thy influence and we bow to thee
The atheist's God — the despot of the free
We coldly bend at many a prouder throne
But the heart's homage — it is all thine own.
— Our time is past — we may not stay to raise
The idle paeans of unneeded praise
If the poor graduate's ever frugal board
Shall soon or late so strange a thing afford
One classic tribute shall at least be thine —
The deepest bumper of the brightest wine —
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