The summer day is closed—the sun is set:Well they have done their office, those bright hours,The latest of whose train goes softly outIn the red West. The green blade of the groundHas risen, and herds have cropped it; the young twigHas spread its plaited tissues to the sun;Flowers of the garden and the waste have blownAnd withered; seeds have fallen upon the soil,From bursting cells, and in their graves awaitTheir resurrection. Insects from the poolsHave filled the air awhile with humming wings,That now are still for ever; painted mothsHave wandered the blue sky, and died again;The mother-bird hath broken for her broodTheir prison shell, or shoved them from the nest,Plumed for their earliest flight. In bright alcoves,In woodland cottages with barky walls,In noisome cells of the tumultuous town,Mothers have clasped with joy the new-born babe.Graves by the lonely forest, by the shoreOf rivers and of ocean, by the waysOf the thronged city, have been hollowed outAnd filled, and closed. This day hath parted friendsThat ne'er before were parted; it hath knitNew friendships; it hath seen the maiden plightHer faith, and trust her peace to him who longHad wooed; and it hath heard, from lips which lateWere eloquent of love, the first harsh word,That told the wedded one her peace was flown.Farewell to the sweet sunshine! One glad dayIs added now to Childhood's merry days,And one calm day to those of quiet Age.Still the fleet hours run on; and as I lean,Amid the thickening darkness, lamps are lit,By those who watch the dead, and those who twineFlowers for the bride. The mother from the eyesOf her sick infant shades the painful light,And sadly listens to his quick-drawn breath.
Oh thou great Movement of the Universe,Or Change, or Flight of Time—for ye are one!That bearest, silently, this visible sceneInto night's shadow and the streaming raysOf starlight, whither art thou bearing me?I feel the mighty current sweep me on,Yet know not whither. Man foretells afarThe courses of the stars; the very hourHe knows when they shall darken or grow bright;Yet doth the eclipse of Sorrow and of DeathCome unforewarned. Who next, of those I love,Shall pass from life, or, sadder yet, shall fallFrom virtue? Strife with foes, or bitterer strifeWith friends, or shame and general scorn of men--Which who can bear?—or the fierce rack of pain,Lie they within my path? Or shall the yearsPush me, with soft and inoffensive pace,Into the stilly twilight of my age?Or do the portals of another lifeEven now, while I am glorying in my strength,Impend around me? Oh! beyond that bourne,In the vast cycle of being which beginsAt that broad threshold, with what fairer formsShall the great law of change and progress clotheIts workings? Gently—so have good men taught--Gently, and without grief, the old shall glideInto the new; the eternal flow of things,Like a bright river of the fields of heaven,Shall journey onward in perpetual peace.
THE PAINTED CUP.°
The fresh savannas of the SangamonHere rise in gentle swells, and the long grassIs mixed with rustling hazels. Scarlet tuftsAre glowing in the green, like flakes of fire;The wanderers of the prairie know them well,And call that brilliant flower the Painted Cup.
Now, if thou art a poet, tell me notThat these bright chalices were tinted thusTo hold the dew for fairies, when they meetOn moonlight evenings in the hazel bowers,And dance till they are thirsty. Call not up,Amid this fresh and virgin solitude,The faded fancies of an elder world;But leave these scarlet cups to spotted mothsOf June, and glistening flies, and humming-birds,To drink from, when on all these boundless lawnsThe morning sun looks hot. Or let the windO'erturn in sport their ruddy brims, and pourA sudden shower upon the strawberry plant,To swell the reddening fruit that even nowBreathes a slight fragrance from the sunny slope.
But thou art of a gayer fancy. Well--Let then the gentle Manitou of flowers,Lingering amid the bloomy waste he loves,Though all his swarthy worshippers are gone--Slender and small, his rounded cheek all brownAnd ruddy with the sunshine; let him comeOn summer mornings, when the blossoms wake,And part with little hands the spiky grass;And touching, with his cherry lips, the edgeOf these bright beakers, drain the gathered dew.