THE DARKENED MIND.—WHAT RABBI JEHOSHA SAID. 407 First-born, for whom by day and night I yearn, Balanced and just are all of God's de crees; Thou art avenged, my first-born, sleep in peace!" THE DARKENED MIND. THE fire is burning clear and blithely, Pleasantly whistles the winter wind; We are about thee, thy friends and kindred, On us all flickers the firelight kind; There thou sittest in thy wonted corner Lone and awful in thy darkened mind. There thou sittest; now and then thou moanest; Thou dost talk with what we cannot see, Lookest at us with an eye so doubtful, It doth put us very far from thee; There thou sittest; we would fain be nigh thee, But we know that it can never be. We can touch thee, still we are no WHAT RABBI JEHOSHA SAID. RABBI JEHOSHA used to say Rabbi Jehosha had the skill To know that Heaven is in God's will; 'T were glorious, no doubt, to be Elfish daughter of Apollo ! Thee, from thy father stolen and bound Now in the ample chimney-place, VI. O thou of home the guardian Lar, Therefore with thee I love to read Life in the withered words! how swift While the gray snow-storm, held aloof, Now the kind nymph to Bacchus borne By him with fire, by her with dreams, For thou hast magic beyond wine, Thou fillest the pauses of the speech VIII. Thou holdest not the master key With which thy Sire sets free the mys tic gates Of Past and Future: not for common fates Do they wide open fling, And, with a far-heard ring, Swing back their willing valves melo diously; Only to ceremonial days, And great processions of imperial song Doth such high privilege belong : The terror comes to me subdued Are those, I muse, the Easter chimes? To the fine quiet that sublimes And when the storm o'erwhelms the shore, I watch entranced as, o'er and o'er, Now large and near, now more and more Withdrawing faintly. This, too, despairing sailors see While through the dark the shuddering sea Gropes for the ships. And is it right, this mood of mind The events in line of battle go; In vain for me their trumpets blow In death's dark arches, And through the sod hears throbbing slow The muffled marches. O Duty, am I dead to thee That drifts tow'rd Silence? My Dante frowns with lip-locked mien, As who would say, ""T is those, I ween, Whom lifelong armor-chafe makes lean That win the laurel " The Pope himself to see in dream He lies there, the sogdologer ! His precious flanks with stars besprent, Worthy to swim in Castaly! The friend by whom such gifts are sent, For him shall bumpers full be spent, His health! be Luck his fast ally! I see him trace the wayward brook Amid the forest mysteries, Where at their shades shy aspens look, Or where, with many a gurgling crook, It croons its woodland histories. I see leaf-shade and sun-fleck lend Their tremulous, sweet vicissitude To smooth, dark pool, to crinkling bend, O, stew him, Ann, as 't were your friend, With amorous solicitude!) I see him step with caution due, Soft as if shod with moccasins, Grave as in church, for who plies you, Sweet craft, is safe as in a pew From all our common stock o' sins. The unerring fly I see him cast, That as a rose-leaf falls as soft, A flash! a whirl! he has him fast! We tyros, how that struggle last Confuses and appalls us oft. The friend who gave our board such gust, Life's care may he o'erstep it half, And, when Death hooks him, as he must, He 'll do it handsomely, I trust, And John H-write his epitaph! O, born beneath the Fishes' sign, Of constellations happiest, May he somewhere with Walton dine, May Horace send him Massic wine, And Burns Scotch drink, the nappiest ! And when they come his deeds to weigh, And how he used the talents his, One trout-scale in the scales he'll lay (If trout had scales), and 't will outsway The wrong side of the balances. |