Pain to thee the deep sensation,
Rapture in participation,

Yet but torture if comprest
In a lone, unfriended breast.

Absent still! Ah! come and bless me!
Let these eyes again caress thee;
Once, in caution, I could fly thee:
Now, I nothing could deny thee;
In a look if death there be,
Come, and I will gaze on thee!

LOSS OF THE FIRST-BORN.

I SAW a pale young mother bending o'er

Her first-born hope. Its soft blue eyes were closed
Not in the balmy dream of downy rest,

In Death's embrace the shrouded babe reposed;
It slept the dreamless sleep that wakes no more.
A low sigh struggled in her heaving breast,
But yet she wept not: hers was the deep grief
The heart, in its desolation, feels;
Which breathes no impassioned accents wild,

But slowly the warm pulse of life congeals;
A grief which from the world seeks no relief-
A mother's sorrow o'er her first-born child.
She gazed upon it with a steadfast eye,

Which seemed to say, "Oh, would I were with thee!" As if her every earthly hope were fled

With that departed cherub. Even he

Her young heart's choice, who breathed a father's sigh
Of bitter anguish o'er the unconscious dead-

Felt not while weeping by its funeral bier,
One pang so deep as hers, who shed no tear,

EDITH.

By those blue eyes that shine

Dove-like and innocent,

Yet with a lustre to their softness lent
By the chaste fire of guileless purity,
And by the rounded temple's symmetry;
(Like Virgin Mary's pictur'd o'er the shrine,)

In simple negligence of art;

By the young smile on lips whose accents fall
With dulcet music, bland to all,

Like downward floating blossoms from the trees
Detached in silver showers by the playful breeze;
And by the cheek, ever so purely pale,

Save when thy heart in livelier kindness glows; By its then tender bloom, whose delicate hue, Is like the morning's tincture of the rose, The snowy veils of the gossamer mist seen through; And by the flowing outlines grace,

Around thy features like a halo thrown,

Reminding of that nobler race

Beneath a lovelier heaven in kindlier climates known,
Whose beauty, both the moral and the mortal,
Stood at perfection's portal,

And still doth hold a rank surpassing all compare;
By the divinely meek and placid air

Which witnesseth so well that all the charms
It lights and warms,

Though but the finer fashion of the clay

Deserve to be adored, since they

Are emanations from a soul allowed

Thus radiantly to glorify its dwelling,

That goodness like a visible thing avowed,
May awe and win, and temper and prevail :
And by all these combined!

I call upon thy form ideal,

So deeply in my memory shrined,
To rise before my vision like the real,
Whenever passion's tides are swelling,

Or vanity misleads, or discontent
Rages with wishes, vain and impotent.
Then, while the tumults of my heart increase,
I call upon thy image-then to rise

In sweet and solemn beauty, like the moon,
Resplendent in the firmament of June,

Through the still hours of night to lonely eyes. I gaze and muse thereon, and tempests ceaseAnd round me falls an atmosphere of peace.

FORGETFULNESS.

WE parted!-Friendship's dream had cast
Deep interest o'er the brief farewell,
And left upon the shadowy past

Full many a thought on which to dwell.:
Such thoughts as come in early youth,
And live in fellowship with hope;
Robed in the brilliant robes of truth,
Unfitted with the world to cope.

We parted! He went o'er the sea,
And deeper solitude was mine ;-
Yet there remained in memory

For feeling still a sacred shrine:
And Thought and Hope were offered up
Till their eternal essence fled,
And Disappointment from the cup
Its dark libations poured instead.

We parted! 'Twas an idle dream

That thus we e'er should meet again; For who that knew man's heart, would deem That it could long unchanged remain He sought a foreign clime and learned Another language which expressed

To strangers the rich thoughts that burned With unquenched power within his breast.

And soon he better loved to speak

In those new accents than his own; His native tongue seemed cold and weak, To breathe the wakened passions' tone. He wandered far, and lingered long,

And drank so deep of Lethe's stream,
That each new feeling grew more strong,
And all the past was like a dream.

We met a few glad words were spoken,
A few kind glances were exchanged;
But friendship's first romance was broken-
His had been from me estranged.

I feel it all-we met no more

My heart was true, but it was proud;

Life's early confidence was o'er,
And hope had sat beneath a cloud.

We met no more-for neither sought
To reunite the severed chain
Of social intercourse; for naught
Could join its parted links again.
Too much of the wide world had been
Between us for too long a time,
And he had looked on many a scene,
The beautiful and the sublime.

And he had themes on which to dwell,
And memories that were not mine,
Which form'd a separating spell,

And drew a mystic boundary line.
His thoughts were wanderers--and the things
Which brought back friendship's joys to me,
To him were but the spirit's wings

Which bore him o'er the distant sea.

Far he had seen the evening star

Glancing its rays o'er ocean's waves, And marked the moonbeams from afar, Lighting the Grecian heroes' graves; And he had gazed on trees and flowers Beneath Italia's sunny skies,

And listened, in fair lady's bowers,

To Genius' words and Beauty's sighs.

His steps had echoed through the halls
Of grandeur, long left desolate;
And he had climbed the crumbling walls,
Or oped perforce the hingeless gate;
And mused o'er many an ancient pile,
In ruin still magnificent,

Whose histories could the hour beguile
With dreams before to Fancy lent.

Such recollections come to him,

With moon, and stars, and summer. flowers; To me they bring the shadow dim

Of earlier and of happier hours:

I would those shadows darker fell-
For life, with its best powers to bless,
Has but few memories loved as well,

Or welcome as forgetfulness!

YES, THOU ART FORGIVEN.

FORGIVE thee? yes! Within my heart
No anger can find rest;

I harbour not within its cells

Such an unwelcome guest.

My love shall not by unkind words
From its repose, be driven;

Though seven times thou shouldst offend,
Yet, still thou art forgiven.

Forgive thee? yes! Thou needst not pray
With such a trembling voice;

For, if my words can ever cause
Thy sad heart to rejoice,

Then rest assured my heart to thee
Shall be more closely riven;
And I shall speak the welcome words,
Yes, love, thou art forgiven.

Forgive thee? yes! as long as earth
Its revolutions make!

As long as falsehood and deceit

Before the truth shall quake.

As long as "lamps of life are hung
Upon the walls of heaven,

So long shall I say unto thee,
Yes, love, thou art forgiven.

LINES, TO SALLIE.

How beautiful! my heart's desire!

The idol, at whose shrine

I offer up the holy fire

Of love-a power divine.

A power to which 'tis bliss to yield,
Its sceptre o'er my soul.

Thou beautiful! a captive bound,

I ask not liberty

From chains and bonds entwined around
My soul, and linked to thee.

Or, if from these I would be free,

Yet still, O still would I

Be bound, thou beautiful, to thee,
By one sweet, holy tie !