Poems

Dwells there a shadow on thy brow—
A look that years impart?
Does there a thought of vanished hours
Come ever o'er thy heart?

Or give those earnest eyes yet back
An image of the soul,
Mirrored in truth, in light and joy,
Above the world's control?

So may their gaze be ever fraught
With utterance deep and strong,
Yielding a holy strength to right,
A stern rebuke to wrong!

Thy soul, upborne on wisdom's wings,
In brighter morn will find
Life hath a higher recompense
Than just to please mankind.

Supreme and omnipresent God,
Guide him in wisdom's way!
Give peaceful triumph to the truth,
Bid error melt away!

Lynn, Mass., November 8, 1866.

SIGNS OF THE HEART

Come to me, joys of heaven!
Breathe through the summer air
A balm—the long-lost leaven
Dissolving death, despair!
O little heart,
To me thou art
A sign that never can depart.

Come to me, peace on earth!
From out life's billowy sea,—
A wave of welcome birth,—
The Life that lives in Thee!
O Love divine,
This heart of Thine
Is all I need to comfort mine.

Come when the shadows fall,
And night grows deeply dark;
The barren brood, O call
With song of morning lark;
And from above,
Dear heart of Love,
Send us thy white-winged dove.

Pleasant View, Concord, N. H., 1899.

FLOWERS

Mirrors of morn
Whence the dewdrop is born,
Soft tints of the rainbow and skies—
Sisters of song,
What a shadowy throng
Around you in memory rise!

Far do ye flee,
From your green bowers free,
Fair floral apostles of love,
Sweetly to shed
Fragrance fresh round the dead,
And breath of the living above.

Flowers for the brave—
Be he monarch or slave,
Whose heart bore its grief and is still!
Flowers for the kind—
Aye, the Christians who wind
Wreaths for the triumphs o'er ill!

Pleasant View, Concord, N. H., May 21, 1904.

TO THE OLD YEAR—1865

Pass on, returnless year!
The track behind thee is with glory crowned;
The turf where thou hast trod is holy ground.
Pass proudly to thy bier!

Chill was thy midnight day,
While Justice grasped the sword to hold her throne,
And on her altar our loved Lincoln's own
Great willing heart did lay.

Thy purpose hath been won!
Thou point'st thy phantom finger, grim and cold,
To the dark record of our guilt unrolled,
And smiling, say'st, "'Tis done!

"This record I will bear
To the dim chambers of eternity—
The chain and charter I have lived to see
Purged by the cannon's prayer;

"Convulsion, carnage, war;
The pomp and tinsel of unrighteous power;
Bloated oppression in its awful hour,—
I, dying, dare abhor!"

One word, receding year,
Ere thou grow tremulous with shadowy night!
Say, will the young year dawn with wisdom's light
To brighten o'er thy bier?

Or we the past forget,
And heal her wounds too tenderly to last?
Or let today grow difficult and vast
With traitors unvoiced yet?

Though thou must leave the tear,—
Hearts bleeding ere they break in silence yet,
Wrong jubilant and right with bright eye wet,—
Thou fast expiring year,

Thy work is done, and well:
Thou hast borne burdens, and may take thy rest,
Pillow thy head on time's untired breast.
Illustrious year, farewell!

Lynn, Mass., January 1, 1866.

INVOCATION FOR 1868

Father of every age,
Of every rolling sphere,
Help us to write a deathless page
Of truth, this dawning year!

Help us to humbly bow
To Thy all-wise behest—
Whate'er the gift of joy or woe,
Knowing Thou knowest best.

Aid our poor soul to sing
Above the tempest's glee;
Give us the eagle's fearless wing,
The dove's to soar to Thee!

All-merciful and good,
Hover the homeless heart!
Give us this day our daily food
In knowing what Thou art!

Swampscott, Mass., January 1, 1868.

CHRISTMAS MORN

Blest Christmas morn, though murky clouds
Pursue thy way,
Thy light was born where storm enshrouds
Nor dawn nor day!

Dear Christ, forever here and near,
No cradle song,
No natal hour and mother's tear,
To thee belong.

Thou God-idea, Life-encrowned,
The Bethlehem babe—
Beloved, replete, by flesh embound—
Was but thy shade!

Thou gentle beam of living Love,
And deathless Life!
Truth infinite,—so far above
All mortal strife,

Or cruel creed, or earth-born taint:
Fill us today
With all thou art—be thou our saint,
Our stay, alway.

December, 1898.

EASTER MORN

Gently thou beckonest from the giant hills
The new-born beauty in the emerald sky,
And wakening murmurs from the drowsy rills—
O gladsome dayspring! 'reft of mortal sigh
To glorify all time—eternity—
With thy still fathomless Christ-majesty.

E'en as Thou gildest gladdened joy, dear God,
Give risen power to prayer; fan Thou the flame
Of right with might; and midst the rod,
And stern, dark shadows cast on Thy blest name,
Lift Thou a patient love above earth's ire,
Piercing the clouds with its triumphal spire.

While sacred song and loudest breath of praise
Echo amid the hymning spheres of light,—
With heaven's lyres and angels' loving lays,—
Send to the loyal struggler for the right,
Joy—not of time, nor yet by nature sown,
But the celestial seed dropped from Love's throne.

Prolong the strain "Christ risen!" Sad sense, annoy
No more the peace of Soul's sweet solitude!
Deep loneness, tear-filled tones of distant joy,
Depart! Glad Easter glows with gratitude—
Love's verdure veils the leaflet's wondrous birth—
Rich rays, rare footprints on the dust of earth.

Not life, the vassal of the changeful hour,
Nor burdened bliss, but Truth and Love attest
The solemn splendor of immortal power,—
The ever Christ, and glorified behest,
Poured on the sense which deems no suffering vain
That wipes away the sting of death—sin, pain.

Pleasant View, Concord, N. H., April 18, 1900.

RESOLUTIONS FOR THE DAY

To rise in the morning and drink in the view—
The home where I dwell in the vale,
The blossoms whose fragrance and charms ever new
Are scattered o'er hillside and dale;

To gaze on the sunbeams enkindling the sky—
A loftier life to invite—
A light that illumines my spiritual eye,
And inspires my pen as I write;

To form resolutions, with strength from on high,
Such physical laws to obey,
As reason with appetite, pleasures deny,
That health may my efforts repay;

To kneel at the altar of mercy and pray
That pardon and grace, through His Son,
May comfort my soul all the wearisome day,
And cheer me with hope when 'tis done;

To daily remember my blessings and charge,
And make this my humble request:
Increase Thou my faith and my vision enlarge,
And bless me with Christ's promised rest;

To hourly seek for deliverance strong
From selfishness, sinfulness, dearth,
From vanity, folly, and all that is wrong—
With ambition that binds us to earth;

To kindly pass over a wound, or a foe
(And mem'ry but part us awhile),
To breathe forth a prayer that His love I may know,
Whose mercies my sorrows beguile,—

If these resolutions are acted up to,
And faith spreads her pinions abroad,
'Twill be sweet when I ponder the days may be few
That waft me away to my God.

Written in girlhood.

O FOR THY WINGS, SWEET BIRD!

O for thy wings, sweet bird!
And soul of melody by being blest—
Like thee, my voice had stirred
Some dear remembrance in a weary breast.

But whither wouldst thou rove,
Bird of the airy wing, and fold thy plumes?
In what dark leafy grove
Wouldst chant thy vespers 'mid rich glooms?

Or sing thy love-lorn note—
In deeper solitude, where nymph or saint
Has wooed some mystic spot,
Divinely desolate the shrine to paint?

Yet wherefore ask thy doom?
Blessed compared with me thou art—
Unto thy greenwood home
Bearing no bitter memory at heart;

Wearing no earthly chain,
Thou canst in azure bright soar far above;
Nor pinest thou in vain
O'er joys departed, unforgotten love.

O take me to thy bower!
Beguile the lagging hours of weariness
With strain which hath strange power
To make me love thee as I love life less!

From mortal consciousness
Which binds to earth—infirmity of woe!
Or pining tenderness—
Whose streams will never dry or cease to flow;

An aching, voiceless void,
Hushed in the heart whereunto none reply,
And in the cringing crowd
Companionless! Bird, bear me through the sky!

Written more than sixty years ago for the New Hampshire Patriot.

COME THOU

Come, in the minstrel's lay;
When two hearts meet,
And true hearts greet,
And all is morn and May.

Come Thou! and now, anew,
To thought and deed
Give sober speed,
Thy will to know, and do.

Stay! till the storms are o'er—
The cold blasts done,
The reign of heaven begun,
And Love, the evermore.

Be patient, waiting heart:
Light, Love divine
Is here, and thine;
You therefore cannot part.

"The seasons come and go:
Love, like the sea,
Rolls on with thee,—
But knows no ebb and flow.

"Faith, hope, and tears, triune,
Above the sod
Find peace in God,
And one eternal noon."

Oh, Thou hast heard my prayer;
And I am blest!
This is Thy high behest:
Thou, here and everywhere.

WISH AND ITEM

To the editor of the Item, Lynn, Mass.

I hope the heart that's hungry
For things above the floor,
Will find within its portals
An item rich in store;

That melancholy mortals
Will count their mercies o'er,
And learn that Truth and wisdom
Have many items more;

That when a wrong is done us,
It stirs no thought of strife;
And Love becomes the substance,
As item, of our life;

That every ragged urchin,
With bare feet soiled or sore,
Share God's most tender mercies,—
Find items at our door.

Then if we've done to others
Some good ne'er told before,
When angels shall repeat it,
'Twill be an item more.

DEDICATION OF A TEMPERANCE HALL

Author of all divine
Gifts, lofty, pure, and free,
Temperance and truth in song sublime
An offering bring to Thee!

A temple, whose high dome
Rose from a water-cup;
And from its altar to Thy throne
May we press on and up!

And she—last at the cross,
First at the tomb, who waits—
Woman—will watch to cleanse from dross
The cause she elevates.

Sons of the old Bay State,
Work for our glorious cause!
And be your waiting hearts elate,
Since temperance makes your laws.

"Temples of Honor," all,
"Social," or grand, or great,
This blazoned, brilliant temperance hall
To Thee we dedicate.

"Good Templars" one and all,
Good "Sons," and daughters, too,
We dedicate this temperance hall
To God, to Truth, and you!

Lynn, Mass., August 4, 1866.

LINES

Come, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer.—Moore.

Was that fold for the lambkin soft virtue's repose,
Where the weary and earth-stricken lay down their woes,—
When the fountain and leaflet are frozen and sere,
And the mountains more friendless,—their home is not here?

When the herd had forsaken, and left them to stray
From the green sunny slopes of the woodland away;
Where the music of waters had fled to the sea,
And this life but one given to suffer and be?

Was it then thou didst call them to banish all pain,
And the harpstring, just breaking, reecho again
To a strain of enchantment that flowed as the wave,
Where they waited to welcome the murmur it gave?

Oh, there's never a shadow where sunshine is not,
And never the sunshine without a dark spot;
Yet there's one will be victor, for glory and fame,
Without heart to define them, were only a name!

Lynn, Mass., February 19, 1868.

TO THE SUNDAY SCHOOL CHILDREN

Who sent me the picture depictive of Isaiah xi.

Jesus loves you! so does mother:
Glad thy Eastertide:
Loving God and one another,
You in Him abide.
Ours through Him who gave you to us,—
Gentle as the dove,
Fondling e'en the lion furious,
Leading kine with love.

Father, in Thy great heart hold them
Ever thus as Thine!
Shield and guide and guard them; and, when
At some siren shrine
They would lay their pure hearts' off'ring,
Light with wisdom's ray—
Beacon beams—athwart the weakly,
Rough or treacherous way.

Temper every trembling footfall,
Till they gain at last—
Safe in Science, bright with glory—
Just the way Thou hast:
Then, O tender Love and wisdom,
Crown the lives thus blest
With the guerdon of Thy bosom,
Whereon they may rest!

Pleasant View, Concord, N. H., April 3, 1899.

HOPE

Tis borne on the zephyr at eventide's hour;
It falls on the heart like the dew on the flower,—
An infinite essence from tropic to pole,
The promise, the home, and the heaven of Soul.

Hope happifies life, at the altar or bower,
And loosens the fetters of pride and of power;
It comes through our tears, as the soft summer rain,
To beautify, bless, and make joyful again.

The harp of the minstrel, the treasure of time;
A rainbow of rapture, o'erarching, divine;
The God-given mandate that speaks from above,—
No place for earth's idols, but hope thou, and love.

TO ETTA

Fair girl, thy rosebud heart rests warm
Within life's summer bowers!
Nor blasts of winter's angry storm,
Nor April's changeful showers,

Its leaves have shed or bowed the stem;
But gracefully it stands—
A gem in beauty's diadem,
Unplucked by ruthless hands.

Thus may it ripen into bloom,
Fresh as the fragrant sod,
And yield its beauty and perfume
An offering pure to God.

Sweet as the poetry of heaven,
Bright as her evening star,
Be all thy life in music given,
While beauty fills each bar.

Lynn, Mass., December 8, 1866.

NEVERMORE

Are the dear days ever coming again,
As sweetly they came of yore,
Singing the olden and dainty refrain,
Oh, ever and nevermore?

Ever to gladness and never to tears,
Ever the gross world above;
Never to toiling and never to fears,
Ever to Truth and to Love?

Can the forever of happiness be
Outside this ever of pain?
Will the hereafter from suffering free
The weary of body and brain?

Weary of sobbing, like some tired child
Over the tears it has shed;
Weary of sowing the wayside and wild,
Watching the husbandman fled;

Nevermore reaping the harvest we deem,
Evermore gathering in woe—
Say, are the sheaves and the gladness a dream,
Or to the patient who sow?

Lynn, Mass., September 3, 1871.

MEETING OF MY DEPARTED MOTHER AND HUSBAND

Joy for thee, happy friend! thy bark is past
The dangerous sea, and safely moored at last—
Beyond rough foam.
Soft gales celestial, in sweet music bore—
Spirit emancipate for this far shore—
Thee to thy home.

"You've traveled long, and far from mortal joys,
To Soul's diviner sense, that spurns such toys,
Brave wrestler, lone.
Now see thy ever-self; Life never fled;
Man is not mortal, never of the dead:
The dark unknown.

"When hope soared high, and joy was eagle-plumed,
Thy pinions drooped; the flesh was weak, and doomed
To pass away.
But faith triumphant round thy death-couch shed
Majestic forms; and radiant glory sped
The dawning day.

"Intensely grand and glorious life's sphere,—
Beyond the shadow, infinite appear
Life, Love divine,—
Where mortal yearnings come not, sighs are stilled,
And home and peace and hearts are found and filled,
Thine, ever thine.

"Bearest thou no tidings from our loved on earth,
The toiler tireless for Truth's new birth
All-unbeguiled?
Our joy is gathered from her parting sigh:
This hour looks on her heart with pitying eye,—
What of my child?"

"When, severed by death's dream, I woke to Life,
She deemed I died, and could not know the strife
At first to fill
That waking with a love that steady turns
To God; a hope that ever upward yearns,
Bowed to His will.

"Years had passed o'er thy broken household band,
When angels beckoned me to this bright land,
With thee to meet.
She that has wept o'er thee, kissed my cold brow,
Rears the sad marble to our memory now,
In lone retreat.

"By the remembrance of her loyal life,
And parting prayer, I only know my wife,
Thy child, shall come—
Where farewells cloud not o'er our ransomed rest—
Hither to reap, with all the crowned and blest,
Of bliss the sum.

"When Love's rapt sense the heartstrings gently sweep
With joy divinely fair, the high and deep,
To call her home,
She shall mount upward unto purer skies;
We shall be waiting, in what glad surprise,
Our spirits' own!"