And, when he was made full to overflowing

With all the loveliness of heaven and earth,

Out rushed his song, like molten iron glowing,

To show God sitting by the humblest hearth.

With calmest courage he was ever ready

To teach that action was the truth of thought,

And, with strong arm and purpose firm and steady,

An anchor for the drifting world he wrought.

So did he make the meanest man partaker

Of all his brother-gods unto him gave;

All souls did reverence him and

name him Maker,

And when he died heaped temples
on his
grave.

And still his deathless words of light are swimming

Serene throughout the great deep infinite

Of human soul, unwaning and un

dimming,

To cheer and guide the mariner at night.

II.

Not his the song, which, in its metre holy,

Chimes with the music of the eternal stars,

Humbling the tyrant, lifting up the lowly,

And sending sun through the soul's prison-bars.

Maker no more,--Oh, no! unmaker rather,

For he unmakes who doth not all put forth

The power given freely by our loving Father

To show the body's dross, the spirit's worth.

Awake! great spirit of the ages olden !

Shiver the mists that hide thy

starry lyre,

And let man's soul be yet again beholden

To thee for wings to soar to her desire.

Oh, prophesy no more to-morrow's splendour,

Be no more shamefaced to speak out for Truth,

Lay on her altar all the gushings tender,

The hope, the fire, the loving faith of youth!

Oh, prophesy no more the Maker's coming,

Say not his onward footsteps thou canst hear

In the dim void, like to the awful humming

Of the great wings of some newlighted sphere!

Oh, prophesy no more, but be the Poet!

This longing was but granted

unto thee

That, when all beauty thou couldst feel and know it,

That beauty in its highest thou couldst be.

rhymer

Who lies with idle elbow on the grass,

And fits his singing, like a cunning timer,

To all men's prides and fancies as they pass.

sea-like longings,

Who dimly hearest voices call on thee,

Whose soul is overfilled with mighty throngings

Of love, and fear, and glorious agony,

clearer eyes,

And thou in larger measure dost inherit

What made thy great forerunners free and wise.

Sit thou enthroned where the Poet's mountain

Above the thunder lifts its silent peak,

And roll thy songs down like a gathering fountain,

They all may drink and find the rest they seek.

Sing! there shall silence grow in earth and heaven,

A silence of deep awe and wondering;

For, listening gladly, bend the angels, even,

To hear a mortal like an angel sing.

III.

Among the toil-worn poor my soul is seeking

For one to bring the Maker's name to light,

To be the voice of that almighty speaking

Which every age demands to do it right.

Proprieties our silken bards environ;

He who would be the tongue of this wide land

Must string his harp with chords of sturdy iron

And strike it with a toil-browned hand;

One who hath dwelt with Nature well attended,

Who hath learnt wisdom from

her mystic books,

Whose soul with all her countless lives hath blended,

So that all beauty awes us in his looks;

Who not with body's waste his soul hath pampered,

Who as the clear north-western wind is free,

Who walks with Form's observances unhampered, And follows the

obediently;

One Will

Whose eyes, like windows on a breezy summit,

Control a lovely prospect every.

Doth not the yearning spirit

scorn

In such scant borders to be spanned?

O yes! his fatherland must be
As the blue heaven wide and free!

Is it alone where freedom is,

Where God is God and man is man?

Doth he not claim a broader span For the soul's love of home than this?

O yes! his fatherland must be
As the blue heaven wide and free!

Where'er a human heart doth wear Joy's myrtle-wreath or sorrow's gyves,

Where'er a human spirit strives After a life more true and fair, There is the true man's birthplace grand,

His is a world-wide fatherland!

THE FORLORN.

THE night is dark, the stinging sleet,

Swept by the bitter gusts of air, Drives whistling down the lonely street,

And stiffens on the pavement bare.

The street-lamps flare and struggle dim

Through the white sleet-clouds as they pass,

Or, governed by a boisterous whim, Drop down and rattle on the glass.

One poor, heart-broken, outcast girl` Faces the east-wind's searching flaws,

MIDNIGHT.

THE moon shines white and silent
On the mist, which, like a tide
Of some enchanted ocean,
O'er the wide marsh doth glide,
Spreading its ghost-like billows
Silently far and wide.

A vague and starry magic

Makes all things mysteries,
And lures the earth's dumb spirit
Up to the longing skies,-
I seem to hear dim whispers,
And tremulous replies.

The fireflies o'er the meadow
In pulses come and go;
The elm-trees' heavy shadow
Weighs on the grass below;
And faintly from the distance

The dreaming cock doth crow.

All things look strange and mystic,
The very bushes swell
And take wild shapes and motions, .
As if beneath a spell,-
They seem not the same lilacs

From childhood known so well.

The snow of deepest silence
O'er everything doth fall,
So beautiful and quiet,

And yet so like a pall,-
As if all life were ended,

And rest were come to all.

O wild and wondrous midnight!
There is a might in thee
To make the charmed body
Almost like spirit be,
And give it some faint glimpses
Of immortality!