A NOTHER Poet dead! And who will care
That he hath gone from Life's tumultuous stage?
Ten thousand toiling, thinking men, who share
The encumbered meed of Labour's heritage; —
Men for whose minds HE wrote inspiring thought,
Tinged with stern glory, as the storm appears —
For whom, with whom his fearless spirit fought;
These will not fail, 'mid sorrows, struggles, fears,
To guard his grave, and write his epitaph in tears.
No trifling, tinkling, moon-struck Bard was he,
Chanting a love-lay in his lady's bower;
His words, like mountain winds, were fresh and free,
And, like the lightnings, winged with withering power;
Like the sharp clang of tried and stubborn steel, —
Like furnace blast, — like hammers tramping strong;
Like deafening drum-roll, startling trumpet-peal, —
Like bruit of battle-cries — 'gainst social wrong
His full and fervid soul leapt out in living song.
Yet do not deem, because he stood alone,
The proud, unpensioned Laureate of the Poor,
Recording, echoing every grief and moan
That hourly issued from the cottage door, —
Oh! do not deem that in his earnest rhymes
(Albeit their virtues he could not forsake)
He veiled their vices, or concealed their crimes;
No! with a champion's well-won right he spake,
And with reproving truth made rudest bosoms quake.
Haply, sometimes, his too indignant mind,
With an impetuous torrent's headlong force,
Rushed with too fierce an energy to find
Pleasure and peace along its troublous course;
But then, the hideous evils which he saw
Flung from the fingers of Oppression dire,
Opened his eyes to many a tyrant law, —
Disturbed his soul, and woke its wildest fire,
As falling stones uprouse the Geyser's slumbering ire!
But he had gentler moods — (and who has not?
Life, though discordant, is not all unrest) —
Moments of pensive calm, when he forgot
The outward world, and all that it possessed;
Then would his harp-strings, with serener strain —
A sad voice calling from his proud heart's core —
Thrill to the memory of some placid pain,
Stir the sweet springs of feeling, shut before,
And make the listener's eyes with tenderest tears run o'er.
No more shall haughty Stanege, bleak and bold,
Clasp him in cloud-robes, as the steep he scales;
No more Win Hill to his rapt gaze unfold
The quiet beauty of his subject-vales;
No more shall Don and Rother, as they flow,
Nor Rivilin, reflecting all that's fair,
Murmur responsive to his joy or woe;
Yet there he reigns! and many a Child of Care,
From Sheffield's crowded glooms, shall seek his spirit there!
That he hath gone from Life's tumultuous stage?
Ten thousand toiling, thinking men, who share
The encumbered meed of Labour's heritage; —
Men for whose minds HE wrote inspiring thought,
Tinged with stern glory, as the storm appears —
For whom, with whom his fearless spirit fought;
These will not fail, 'mid sorrows, struggles, fears,
To guard his grave, and write his epitaph in tears.
No trifling, tinkling, moon-struck Bard was he,
Chanting a love-lay in his lady's bower;
His words, like mountain winds, were fresh and free,
And, like the lightnings, winged with withering power;
Like the sharp clang of tried and stubborn steel, —
Like furnace blast, — like hammers tramping strong;
Like deafening drum-roll, startling trumpet-peal, —
Like bruit of battle-cries — 'gainst social wrong
His full and fervid soul leapt out in living song.
Yet do not deem, because he stood alone,
The proud, unpensioned Laureate of the Poor,
Recording, echoing every grief and moan
That hourly issued from the cottage door, —
Oh! do not deem that in his earnest rhymes
(Albeit their virtues he could not forsake)
He veiled their vices, or concealed their crimes;
No! with a champion's well-won right he spake,
And with reproving truth made rudest bosoms quake.
Haply, sometimes, his too indignant mind,
With an impetuous torrent's headlong force,
Rushed with too fierce an energy to find
Pleasure and peace along its troublous course;
But then, the hideous evils which he saw
Flung from the fingers of Oppression dire,
Opened his eyes to many a tyrant law, —
Disturbed his soul, and woke its wildest fire,
As falling stones uprouse the Geyser's slumbering ire!
But he had gentler moods — (and who has not?
Life, though discordant, is not all unrest) —
Moments of pensive calm, when he forgot
The outward world, and all that it possessed;
Then would his harp-strings, with serener strain —
A sad voice calling from his proud heart's core —
Thrill to the memory of some placid pain,
Stir the sweet springs of feeling, shut before,
And make the listener's eyes with tenderest tears run o'er.
No more shall haughty Stanege, bleak and bold,
Clasp him in cloud-robes, as the steep he scales;
No more Win Hill to his rapt gaze unfold
The quiet beauty of his subject-vales;
No more shall Don and Rother, as they flow,
Nor Rivilin, reflecting all that's fair,
Murmur responsive to his joy or woe;
Yet there he reigns! and many a Child of Care,
From Sheffield's crowded glooms, shall seek his spirit there!