grief

Lord, I confess my sin is great;
Great is my sin. Oh! gently treat
With thy quick flow'r, thy momentany bloom;
Whose life still pressing
Is one undressing,
A steady aiming at a tomb.

Man's age is two hours' work, or three:
Each day doth round about us see.
Thus are we to delights: but we are all
To sorrows old,
If life be told
From what life feeleth, Adam's fall.

O let thy height of mercy then
Compassionate short-breathed men.
Cut me not off for my most foul transgression:

All I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked another way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I'd started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see;
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.

Forget?
Ah, never!
Your eyes, your voice, your lips.
Those little ways of love,
Half-childish yet all-wise
That held me but a slave to you,
Will never loose their bonds.
The power to forget
Would Fate but yield to me.

Remember?
Ah, too well!
The hurt, the pain, the grief.
The wrack of nightly dreams,
The ruth of brooding days,
Have left a lesion in my soul
That only Heaven can heal.
Remembrance is the lot
That Fate does hold for me.

How dear to me the twilight hour!
It breathes, it speaks of pleasures past;
When Laura sought this humble bower,
And o'er it courtly splendours cast.

Fond fancy's friend, dim twilight, hail!
Thou canst the absent nymph restore;
And as around thy shadows sail,
They bring the form I still adore.

Again her pensive smile I view,
Her modest eye's soft chastened fire;
And mark her cheek of tender hue
From thee a softer tint acquire.

No eye but mine in that dim hour

But may a Rural Pen try to set forth
Such a Great Fathers Ancient Grace and worth
I undertake a no less Arduous Theme
Then the Old Sages found the Chaldae Dream
'Tis more then Tythes of a profound respect
That must be paid such a Melchizedeck
Oxford this light with tongues and Arts doth trim
And then his Northern Town doth Challeng him
His Time and Strength he Center'd there in this
To do good works, and be what now he is.
His fulgent Virtues there and learned Strains
Tall comely Presence, Life unsoil'd with Stains

1.

Award, and still in bonds, one day
I stole abroad,
It was high-spring, and all the way
Primros'd, and hung with shade;
Yet, was it frost within,
And surly winds
Blasted my infant buds, and sin
Like clouds eclips'd my mind.

2.

Storm'd thus; I straight perceiv'd my spring
Mere stage, and show,
My walk a monstrous, mountain's thing
Rough-cast with rocks, and snow;
And as a pilgrim's eye
Far from relief,
Measures the melancholy sky

I smiled with skeptic mocking where they told me you were dead,
You of the airy laughter and lightly twinkling feet;
"They tell a dream that haunted a chill gray dawn," I said,
"Death could not touch or claim a thing so vivid and so sweet!"

I looked upon you coffined amid your virgin flowers,
But even that white silence could bring me no belief:
"She lies in maiden sleep," I said. "and in the youngling hours
Her sealed dark eyes will open to scorn our foolish grief."

Now on the hill
The fitful wind is so still
That never a wimpling mist uplifts,
Nor a trembling leaf drop-laden stirs;
From the ancient firs
Aroma of balsam drifts,
And the silent places are filled
With elusive odors distilled
By the rain from asters empearled and frilled,
And a wild wet savor that dwells
Far adown in tawny fallows and bracken dells.

Then with a rush,
Breaking the beautiful hush
Where the only sound was the lisping, low
Converse of raindrops, or the dear sound

All my life's short years had been stern and sterile --
   I stood like one whom the blasts blow back --
As with shipmen whirled through the straits of Peril,
   So fierce foes menaced my every track.

But I steeled my soul to a strong endeavour,
   I bared my brow as the sharp strokes fell,
And I said to my heart -- "Hope on! Hope ever:
   Have Courage -- Courage, and all is well."

Then, bright as the blood in my heart's rich chalice,
   O Blossom, Blossom! -- you came from far;

Lord, I will bless thee all my days,
Thy praise shall dwell upon my tongue;
My soul shall glory in thy grace,
While saints rejoice to hear the song.

Come, magnify the Lord with me,
Come, let us all exalt his name;
I sought th'eternal God, and he
Has not exposed my hope to shame.

I told him all my secret grief,
My secret groaning reached his ears;
He gave my inward pains relief;
And calmed the tumult of my fears.

To him the poor lift up their eyes,
Their faces feel the heav'nly shine;