STANZAS WRITTEN ON THE GRAVE OF AN
ILLEGITIMATE CHILD.
A lonely grave is thine, poor child!
A lonely grave is thine;
No mother's form, in anguish wild,
May o'er thy clay recline,
Beside this little spot of scorn
No sister's love appear;
The flowers that weep at prime of morn
The only mourners here!
Nor dares a father's manlier part
Here vent a father's care,
Remorse would wring his conscious heart,
And hush even nature there.
Thy mother's step would turn away,
Her cheek were dashed with shame-
Orphaned by guilt, thy moment's stay
Nor parent knew, nor name.
Oh, curse of guilt, all curse above!
That "hardens a' within,"
That sours a mother's milk of love
With sorrow, scorn, and sin-
For thee, lorn babe! no tender throe
Might a parent's hope employ,
Thy birth-hour was an hour of woe,
Thy death a tale of joy!
Thrice blest, that to thy day of pain
A date so brief was given;
The light of earth scarce seen, till ta'en
To see the light of heaven!
Had riper periods o'er thee past,
Reproach had galled thy way,
And thou hadst died, perchance, at last,
To grief and guilt a prey.
If the lorn bird complain, or rustling sweep
Soft summer airs o'er foliage waving slow,
Or the hoarse brook come murmuring down the steep,
Where on the enamelled bank I sit below,
With thoughts of love that bid my numbers flow;
"Tis then I see her, though in earth she sleep!
Her, formed in Heaven! I see, and hear, and know! Responsive sighing, weeping as I weep:
"Alas!" she pitying says,
Why hurry life away with swifter flight?
Why from thy eyes this flood of sorrow pour?
No longer mourn my fate! through death my days Become eternal! to eternal light
These eyes which seemed in darkness closed, I raise!"
The eyes, the face, the limbs of heavenly mould,
So long the theme of my impassioned lay,
Charms which so stole me from myself away,
That strange to other men the course I hold:
The crisped locks of pure and lucid gold;
The lightning of the angelic smile, whose ray
To earth could all of Paradise convey,
A little dust are now!—to feeling cold!
And yet I live!--but that I live bewail;
Sunk the loved light that through the tempest led
My shattered bark, bereft of mast and sail :
Hushed be the song that breathed love's purest fire;
Lost is the theme on which my fancy fed,
And turned to mourning my once tuneful lyre.
Not skies serene, with glittering stars inlaid,
Nor gallant ships o'er tranquil ocean dancing,
Nor gay careering knights in arms advancing,
Nor wild herds bounding through the forest glade,
Nor tidings new of happiness delayed,
Nor poesie, Love's witchery enchanting,
Nor lady's song beside clear fountain glancing,
In beauty's pride, with chastity arrayed;
Nor aught of lovely, aught of gay in show,
Shall touch my heart, now cold within her tomb
Who was erewhile my life and light below!
So heavy-tedious- -sad-my days unblest,
That I, with strong desire, invoke Death's gloom,
Her to behold, whom ne'er to have seen were blest!
WITH THE FOREGOING TRANSLATIONS.
THE brook, soft rippling on its pebbled way,
With many a winding fondly lingers long
In valleys low, stealing wild weeds among,
And pendent boughs that o'er its surface play;
Its humble pride still to reflect the gay
And varied flowers that round its mirror throng;
So I, erewhile, lone warbled my rude song,
Echoing Valclusa's sad melodious lay :
And as, lured forth along the unsheltered plain,
The little stream at length, with bolder course,
Bears tributary waters to the main;
I, too, though late, to thee my offering bear,
Adventurous, won by Friendship's gentle force
From covert shades, the broader light to dare.
O I am not of this countrie,
And much my heart is wrung,
To wander in a foreign land,
And beg in foreign tongue.
'Tis all to gain a little sum
To bear me o'er the sea;
And hither slowly I am come
To ask your charity.
My home is in the Valteline,
Far inland from the main ;
And every day I wish and pine
To see it once again.
I cannot mend this little store;
My wishing is in vain;
And I shall ne'er behold it more,
Ah never, ne'er again!
If you have ever been abroad,
Bestow an alms on me!
And think you speed me on my road
My native land to see.
My cot still rises to my view,
And will not let me stay;
But I am old, and alms are few,
And sad is the delay!
And must I ever thus deplore
My labour spent in vain?
And shall I ne'er behold it more?
Ah never, ne'er again!
Your country is a pleasant land,
But oh, it is not mine!
I have not here a kindred band
As in the Valteline.
When on my native hills I played,
I breathed not English air;
I did not love an English maid,
When love was all my care.
But I must die on England's strand,
A prisoner on the main!
And ne'er behold my native land,
Ah never, ne'er again!
PLEASURES of Memory!-oh! supremely blest,
And justly proud beyond a poet's praise,
If the pure confines of thy tranquil breast
Contain, indeed, the subject of thy lays!
By me how envied! for to me,
The herald still of misery,
Memory makes her influence known
By sighs and tears, and grief alone:
I greet her as the fiend to whom belong
The vulture's ravening beak, the raven's funeral song.
Alone, at midnight's haunted hour,
When nature woos repose in vain,
Remembrance wastes her penal power,
The tyrant of the burning brain :
She tells of time misspent, of comfort lost,
Of fair occasions gone for ever by ;
Of hope too fondly nursed, too rudely crossed,
Of many a cause to wish, yet fear to die;
For what, except the instinctive fear
Lest she survive, detains me here,
When "all the life of life" is fled?—
What, but the deep inherent dread,
Lest she beyond the grave resume her reign,
And realize the hell that priests and beldames feign.
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