Classic Poem

Ah , lovely Lichfield! that so long hast shone
In blended charms, peculiarly thine own;
Stately, yet rural; through thy choral day,
Though shady, cheerful, and though quiet, gay:
How interesting, how loved, from year to year,
How more than beauteous did thy scenes appear!
Still, as the mild Spring chased the wintry gloom,
Devolved her leaves, and waked her rich perfume,
Thou, with thy fields and groves around thee spread,
Lift'st, in unlessen'd grace, thy spiry head;
But many a loved inhabitant of thine
Sleeps where no vernal sun will ever shine.

Why fled ye all so fast, ye happy hours,
That saw H ONORA'S eyes adorn these bowers?
These darling bowers, that much she loved to hail,
The spires, she call'd " the Ladies of the Vale! "

Fairest, and best! — Oh! can I e'er forget
To thy dear kindness my eternal debt?
Life's opening paths how tenderly it smooth'd,
The joys it heighten'd, and the pains it sooth'd?
No, no! my heart its sacred memory bears,
Bright 'mid the shadows of o'erwhelming years;
When mists of deprivation round me roll,
'Tis the soft sun-beam of my clouded soul.

Ah, dear H ONORA ! that remember'd day,
First on these eyes when shone thy early ray!
Scarce o'er my head twice seven gay springs had gone,
Scarce five o'er thy unconscious childhood flown,
When, fair as their young flowers, thy infant frame
To our glad walls an happy inmate came.
O! summer morning, of unrivall'd light,
Fate wrapt thy rising in prophetic white!
June, the bright month, when Nature joys to wear
The livery of the gay, consummate year,
Gave that envermeil'd day-spring all her powers,
Gemm'd the light leaves, and glow'd upon the flowers;
Bade her plumed nations hail the rosy ray
With warbled orisons from every spray.
Purpureal Tempe, not to thee belong
More poignant fragrance, or more jocund song.

Thrice happy day! thy clear auspicious light
Gave " future years a tincture of thy white; "
Well may her strains thy votive hymn decree,
Whose sweetest pleasures found their source in thee;
The purest, best that memory explores,
Safe in the past's inviolable stores. —
The ardent progress of thy shining hours
Beheld me rove through Lichfield's verdant bowers.
Thoughtless and gay, and volatile and vain,
Circled by nymphs, and youths, a frolic train;
Though conscious that a little orphan child
Had to my parents' guidance, kind and mild,
Recent been summon'd, when disease and death
Shed dark stagnation o'er her mother's breath.
While eight sweet infants' wailful cries deplore
What not the tears of innocence restore;
And while the husband mourn'd his widow'd doom,
And hung despondent o'er the closing tomb,
To us this loveliest scion he consign'd,
Its beauty blossoming, its opening mind.

His heart-felt loss had drawn my April tears,
But childish, womanish, ambiguous years
Find all their griefs as vanishing as keen,
Youth's rising sun soon gilds the showery scene.

On the expected trust no thought I bent,
Unknown the day, unheeded the event.
One sister dear, from spleen, from falsehood free,
Rose to the verge of womanhood with me;
Gloom'd by no envy, by no discord jarr'd,
Our pleasures blended, and our studies shared;
And when with day and waking thoughts they closed,
On the same couch our agile limbs reposed.

Amply in friendship by her virtues blest,
I gave to youthful gaiety the rest;
Considering not how near the period drew
When that transplanted branch should meet our view,
Whose intellectual fruits were doom'd to rise,
Food of the future's heart-expanding joys;
Born to console me when, by Fate severe,
The Much Beloved should press a timeless bier,
My friend, my sister, from my arms be torn,
Sickning and sinking on her bridal morn;
While Hymen, speeding from this mournful dome,
Should drop his darken'd torch upon her tomb.

'Twas eve; — the sun, in setting glory dress'd,
Spread his gold skirts along the crimson west;
A Sunday's eve! — H ONORA , bringing thee,
Friendship's soft Sabbath long it rose to me,
When on the wing of circling seasons borne,
Annual I hail'd its consecrated morn.

In the kind interchange of mutual thought,
Our home myself and gentle sister sought;
Our pleasant home, round which th' ascending gale
Breathes all the freshness of the sloping vale;
On her green verge the spacious walls arise,
View her fair fields, and catch her balmy sighs;
See her near hills the bounded prospect close,
And her blue lake in glassy breadth repose.

With arms entwined, and smiling as we talk'd,
To the maternal room we careless walk'd,
Where sat its honour'd mistress, and with smile
Of love indulgent, from a floral pile
The gayest glory of the summer bower
Cull'd for the new-arrived, — the human flower,
A lovely infant-girl, who pensive stood
Close to her knees, and charm'd us as we view'd.

O! hast thou mark'd the Summer's budded rose,
When 'mid the veiling moss its crimson glows?
So bloom'd the beauty of that fairy-form,
So her dark locks, with golden tinges warm,
Play'd round the timid curve of that white neck,
And sweetly shaded half her blushing cheek.

O! hast thou seen the star of eve on high,
Through the soft dusk of Summer's balmy sky,
Shed its green light, and in the glassy stream
Eye the mild reflex of its trembling beam?
So look'd on us, with tender, bashful gaze,
The destined charmer of our youthful days;
Whose soul its native elevation join'd
To the gay wildness of the infant mind,
Esteem and sacred confidence impress'd
While our fond arms the beauteous child caress'd.

Dear Sensibility! how soon thy glow
Dyed that fair cheek, and gleam'd from that young brow!
How early, Generosity, you taught
The warm disdain of every grov'ling thought,
Round sweet H ONORA , e'en in infant youth,
Shed the majestic light of spotless truth;
Bid her for others' sorrow pour the tear,
For others' safety feel th' instinctive fear;
But for herself, scorning the impulse weak,
Meet every danger with unaltering cheek;
And through the generally unmeaning years
Of heedless childhood, to thy guardian cares,
Angelic Friendship, her young moments give,
And heedless of herself for others live.