SUMMER birds! summer birds. Whither have ye flown?
I was your dear companion once, And now ye leave me lone! Beneath the wide boughs of the tree, Before my father's door,
I used to sit all day to hear
The notes I hear no more!
Summer brooks! summer brooks! Whither do ye glide?
How pleasant was my grassy couch, Your merry waves beside! My life was like your current, then, And smooth and swift it ran; There is no type in summer brooks For slow and thoughtful man.
Summer dells! summer dells! Oh, are ye still the same, As when of old to your retreats,
In wayward mood I came ?
The turf is still as soft and green,
As gently falls the shade:
And so 't would be, though in the grave This form were lowly laid.
Summer flowers! summer flowers! Where are the odors sweet,
Brought by the cool and wafting airs, That stole the summer heat?
I never see your petals now
Wet with the early dew;
Alas! my fresh and morning hopes Have faded, flowers, with you!
Summer friends! summer friends! The careless, light and gay,
Ye too, with fortune's sunny looks,
Like birds, have flown away;
And like the brooks, and dells, and flowers,
That I so loved to see,
Remain within your happy homes,
And never dream of me!
THE sea is mighty, but a mightier sways His restless billows Thou whose hands have scoop'd His boundless gulfs and built his shore, thy breath, That moved in the beginning o'er his face, Moves o'er it evermore. The obedient waves, To its strong motion, roar and rise and fall. Still from that realm of rain thy cloud goes up, As at the first to water the great earth, And keep her valleys green. A hundred realms Watch its broad shadow warping on the wind, And in the drooping shower, with gladness, hear Thy promise of the harvest. I look forth, Over the boundless blue, where joyously, The bright crests of innumerable waves Glance to the sun at once, as when the hands Of a great multitude are upward flung In acclamation. I behold the ships
Gliding from cape to cape, from isle to isle,
Or stemming towards far lands, or hastening home From the old world. It is thy friendly breeze That bears them, with the riches of the land, And treasure of dear lives, till, in the port, The shouting seaman climbs and furls the sail. But who shall bide thy tempest; who shall face The blast that wakes the fury of the sea? O God! thy justice makes the world turn pale, When on the armed fleet, that, royally, Bears down the surges, carrying war to smite Some city, or invade some thoughtless realm, Descends the fierce tornado. The vast hulks Are whirled like chaff upon the waves; the sails Fly, rent like webs of gossamer; the masts Are snapped asunder; downward from the decks, Downward are slung, into the fathomless gulf, Their cruel engines, and their hosts, arrayed In trappings of the battle field, are whelmed By whirlpools, or dashed dead upon the rocks. Then stand the nations still with awe, and pause, A moment from the bloody work of war.
Those restless surges eat away the shores Of earth's old continents, the fertile plain Welters in shallows, headlands crumble down, And the tide drifts the sea sand in the streets Of the drowned city. Thou meanwhile, afar, In the green chambers of the middle sea, Where broadest spread the waters and the line Sinks deepest, while no eye beholds thy work,
Creator! thou dost teach the coral worm To lay his mighty reefs. From age to age, He builds beneath the water, till, at last, His bulwarks overtop the brine, and check The long wave rolling from the Arctic pole To break upon Japan. Thou bidst the fires, That smoulder under ocean, heave on high The new made mountains, and uplift their peaks, A place of refuge for the storm-driven bird. The birds and wafting billows plant the rifts With herb and tree; sweet fountains gush; sweet airs Ripple the living lakes, that, fringed with flowers, Are gathering in the hollows. Thou dost look On thy creation and pronounce it good. Its valleys, glorious with their summer green, Praise Thee in silent beauty, and its woods, Swept by the murmuring winds of ocean, join The murmuring shores in a perpetual hymn.
BY JAMES G. PERCIVAL, ESQ.
(O! COME, loved spirit, come to me
My heart, my heart invoketh thee:
Though dark and cheerless broods my night, Thy presence fills it all with light.
O! come, loved spirit, gently come- O! make beside my heart thy home! Look on me with endearing smile- That look shall all my woes beguile.
O! be thou ever, ever nigh
Bend on me thy complacent eye:
Then shall my heart swell up to thee,
My soul be large, my spirit free.
Bear me away, through sun and star, To worlds of softest light afar: Then bid my wearied eyelids close On pillowed flowers, in blest repose.)
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