Billeder på siden
PDF
ePub

Among the living lights of heaven: 288
Yes-I am of that outcast few,
TO IRAN and to vengeance true,
Who curse the hour your Arabs came
To desolate our shrines of flame,
And swear, before God's burning eye,
To break our country's chains, or die!
Thy bigot sire,- nay, tremble not, -

He, who gave birth to those dear eyes,
With me is sacred as the spot

From which our fires of worship rise! But know - 'twas he I sought that night, When, from my watch-boat on the sea, I caught this turret's glimmering light, And up the rude rocks desperately Rush'd to my prey thou know'st the rest I climb'd the gory vulture's nest,

And found a trembling dove within; Thine, thine the victory-thine the sinIf Love hath made one thought his own, That Vengeance claims first-last-alone! Oh! had we never, never met,

Or could this heart e'en now forget

How link'd, how bless'd we might have been,
Had fate not frown'd so dark between!
Hadst thou been born a Persian maid,

In neighboring valleys had we dwelt,
Through the same fields in childhood play'd,

[ocr errors]

At the same kindling altar knelt, —
Then, then, while all those nameless ties,
In which the charm of Country lies,
Had round our hearts been hourly spun,
Till IRAN's cause and thine were one;
While in thy lute's awakening sigh
I heard the voice of days gone by,

[graphic]

THE FIRE WORSHIPERS.

-I must away!

Both, both are ruined if I stay.

Farewell, sweet life! thou cling'st in vain. Now, vengeance, I am thine again!

And saw, in every smile of thine,
Returning hours of glory shine;

While the wrong'd Spirit of our Land

Liv'd, look'd, and spoke her wrongs through thee,— God! who could then this sword withstand?

Its very flash were victory!

But now

Far as the

estrang'd, divorc'd forever,

grasp of Fate can sever;

Our only ties what love has wove,

[ocr errors]

In faith, friends, country, sunder'd wide;
And then, then only, true to love,

When false to all that's dear beside!
Thy father, IRAN's deadliest foe
Thyself perhaps, even now
- but no
Hate never look'd so lovely yet!
No sacred to thy soul will be
The land of him who could forget

All but that bleeding land for thee.
When other eyes shall see, unmov'd,

Her widows mourn, her warriors fall, Thou'lt think how well one Gheber lov'd, And for his sake thou'lt weep for all! But look

[ocr errors]

With sudden start he turn'd

And pointed to the distant wave,

Where lights, like charnel meteors, burn'd
Bluely, as o'er some seaman's grave;

And fiery darts, at intervals, 234

Flew up all sparkling from the main,

As if each star that nightly falls

Were shooting back to heaven again. "My signal lights!-I must awayBoth, both are ruin'd, if I stay.

Farewell sweet life! thou cling'st in vain –

Now, Vengeance, I am thine again!"

Fiercely he broke away, nor stopp'd,
Nor look'd but from the lattice dropp'd
Down 'mid the pointed crags beneath,
As if he fled from love to death.

While pale and mute young HINDA stood;
Nor mov'd, till in the silent flood
A momentary plunge below

Startled her from her trance of woe;
Shrieking she to the lattice flew,

"I come -I come if in that tide

Thou sleep'st to-night, I'll sleep there too,
In death's cold wedlock, by thy side.
Oh! I would ask no happier bed

Than the chill wave my love lies under: — Sweeter to rest together dead,

Far sweeter, than to live asunder! But no- their hour is not yet come. Again she sees his pinnace fly, Wafting him fleetly to his home,

[ocr errors]

Where'er that ill-starr'd home may lie;

And calm and smooth it seem'd to win
Its moonlit way before the wind,
As if it bore all peace within,

Nor left one breaking heart behind!

« ForrigeFortsæt »