Classic Poem

The bells are gayly pealing, and the crowd,
The thoughtless and the happy, with light hearts,
Are moving by the casement:—I can hear
The rude din of their voices and the tramp
Of hurrying footsteps o'er the pavement nigh,
And my soul sickens in its solitude.
 Each hath his own companion, and can bend,
As to a centre of enlivening warmth,
To some abode of happiness and mirth;—

Greeted by pleasant voices,—words of cheer,
And hospitality,—whose outstretch'd hand
Draws in the smiling stranger at the door.
They go not singly by, as I should go,
But hanging on fond arms. They muse not thoughts
Of strange and timid sadness, such as mine;
But dreams of promised joys are in their souls,
And, in their ears, the music of kind words
That make them happy.

I, alas!—alone,
Of all this populous city, must remain,
Shut up in my dim chamber,—or, perchance,
If I dare venture out among the crowd,
Will be among, not of, them; and appear—
For that I have not walk'd with them before,
Nor been a sharer in their festivals—
As some strange monster brought from foreign climes
But to be baited with the thoughtless gaze,
The rude remark, cold eye and sneering lip,
Till I grow savage, and become, at last,
The rugged brute they do behold in me.

 Talk not to me of solitude!—thou hast
But little of its meaning in thy thought,
And less in thy observance. It is not
To go abroad into the wilderness,
Or dart upon the ocean;—to behold
The broad expanse of prairie or of wood,
And deem,—for that the human form is not
A dweller on its bosom,—(with its shrill
And senseless clamor oft, breaking away
The melancholy of its sweet serene,
That, like a mantle, lifted by the breath
Of some presiding deity, o'erwraps,
Making all mystery and gentleness,)—
That solitude is thine. Thy thought is vain!—
That is no desert, where the heart is free
To its own spirit-worship;—where the soul,
Untainted by the breath of busy life,
Converses with the elements, and grows
To a familiar notion of the skies,
Which are its portion. That is liberty!
And the sweet quiet of the waving woods,
The solemn song of ocean—the blue skies,
That hang like canopies above the plain,
And lend their richest hues to the fresh flowers
That carpet its broad bosom,—are most full
Of solace and the sweetest company!
I love these teeming voids,—their voiceless words,
So full of truest teaching. God is there,
Walking beside me, as, in elder times,
He walk'd beside the shepherds, and gave ear
To the first whisper'd doubts of early thought,
And prompted it aright. Such wilds to me
Seem full of friends and teachers. In the trees,
The never-ceasing billows, winds and leaves,
Feather'd and finny tribes,—all that I see,
All that I hear and fancy,—I have friends,
That soothe my heart to meekness, lift my soul
To loftiest hope, and, to my toiling mind,
Impart just thoughts and safest principles.
They have a language I can understand,
When man is voiceless, or with vexing words
Offends my judgment. They have melodies
That soothe my heart to peace, even as the dame
Soothes her dear infant with a song of sounds
That have no meaning for the older ear,
And mock the seeming wise. Even wint'ry clouds
Have charms for me amid their cheerlessness,
And hang out images of love and light,
At evening, 'mong the stars,—or, ere the dusk
That specks so stilly the gray twilight's wing,
With many colors sweetly intermixt:—
And, when the breezes gather with the night,
And shake the roof-tree under which I sleep,
'Till the dried leaves enshroud me, then I hear
Voices of love and friendship in mine ear,
That speak to me in soothing, idle sounds,
And flatter me, I am not all alone.
 Darting o'er ocean's blue domain, or far
In the deep woods, where the gaunt Choctaw yet
Lingers to perish;—galloping o'er the bald
Yet beautiful plain of prairie,—I become
Part of the world around me, and my heart
Forgets its singleness and solitude.
But, in the city's crowd, where I am one
'Mongst many,—many who delight to throw
The altar I have worshipp'd in the dust—
And trample my best offerings—and revile
My prayers—and scorn the tribute, which I still
Devoted with full heart and purest mind
To the all-wooing and all-visible God,
In nature ever present—having no mood
With mine, nor any sympathy with aught
That I have loved;—'tis there that I am taught
The essence and the form of solitude—
'Tis there that I am lonely!—'mid a world,
To feel I have no business in that world;
And when I hear men laughing, not to join,
Because their cause of mirth is hid from me:—
To feel the lights of the assembly glare
And fever all my senses, till I grow
Stupid, or sad and boorish;—then return,
Sick of false joys and misnamed festivals,
To my own gloomy chambers, and old books
That counsel me no more, and cease to cheer,
And, like an aged dotard, with dull truths,
Significant of nothings, often told,
And told to be denied, that wear me out,
In patience, as in peace;—and then to lie,
And watch the lazy-footed night away,
With fretful nerve, that sorrows when it flies!—
To feel the day advancing which must bring
The weary night once more, that I had pray'd
Forever gone! To hear the laboring wind
Depart, in melting murmurs, with the tide,
And, ere the morn, to catch his sullen roar,
Mocking the ear, with watching overdone,
Returning from his rough lair on the seas!
 If life be now denied me;—if I sit
Within my chamber when all other men
Are revelling;—if I must be alone,
Musing on idle minstrelsy and lore—
Weaving sad fancies with the fleeting hours,
And making fetters of the folding thoughts,
That crush into my heart, and canker there;—
If nature calls me to her company,
Takes up my time, teaches me legends strange,
Prattles of wild conceits that have no form,
Save in extravagant fancy of old years,
When spirits were abroad;—if still she leads
My steps away from the establish'd walks,
And, with seducing strains of syren song,
Beguiles my spirit far among the groves
Of fairy-trodden forests, that I may
Wrestle with dreams, that wear away my days,
And make my nights a peopled realm which steals
Sleep from my eyes, and peace;—if she ordains
That I shall win no human blandishment,
Nor, in the present hour, as other men,
Find meet advantage:—she will sure provide,
Just recompense—a better sphere and life,
Atoning for the past, and full of hope
In a long future;—or she treats me now,
Unkindly, and I may not help complaint.