Poems

Lovest thou me—do you love me? Answer with soul-lighted eyes! Lovest thou me? speak only As stars shine out of the skies. Love is my life—do you love me? Love as the earth loves the sun When he flushes the face of the morning And a beautiful day is begun? Whisper the words of the answer— Give me joys of which angels are blest, If thou lovest me, lovest me truly, In an ocean of music I rest.

Men don't believe in a devil now, as their fathers used to do; They've forced the door of the broadest creed to let His Majesty through. There isn't a print of his cloven foot or a fiery dart from his bow To be found in earth or air to-day, for the world has voted so.

Show me the way that leads to the true life: I do not care what tempests may assail me: I shall be given courage for the strife; I know my strength will not desert or fail me,— I know that I shall conquer in the fray,— Show me the way. Show me the way up to a higher plane, Where body shall be servant of the soul: I do not care what tides of woe or pain Across my life their angry waves may roll, If I but reach the end I seek, some day,— Show me the way.

Grave on her monumental pile, She won from vice, by virtue's smile, Her dazzling crown, her sceptred throne, Affection's wreath, a happy home. The right to worship deep and pure, To bless the orphan, feed the poor, Last at the cross to mourn her Lord, First at the tomb to hear his word.

O'er the hushed harp-strings of the soul There swept a strain, Low, sad and sweet, whose music stole Away all pain. And woke a white-winged angel throng Of thoughts, illumed By faith, and breathed in raptured song With love perfumed.

The soul on earth is an immortal guest, Compelled to starve at an unreal feast; A spark which upward tends by nature's force; A stream diverted from its parent source; A drop dissevered from the boundless sea; A moment parted from eternity; A pilgrim panting for the rest to come; An exile anxious for his native home. — Hannah More.

I live for those who love me, For those who love me true; For the heaven that smiles above me And awaits my presence too: For the human ties that bind me, For the tasks by God assigned me, For the bright hopes left behind me, And the good that I can do. I live to hail that season, By gifted minds foretold, Where men shall live by reason, And not alone by gold— When man to man united, And every wrong thing righted, The whole world shall be lighted, As Eden was of old.

Fleffel, an old writer, is chargeable with the following sonnet:— Well they are gone: my fortune first departed, And then my right good friends went after it: Departing likewise, as the swallows flit After Summer—parasites false-hearted. My servants next gave notice they should quit, And so they did: then my betrothed, a maid I worshipped, also went off, in a fit Of laughter, at my imprudence, she said.

I. Where Midian's hoary mountains in rugged grandeur climb, And rule her desert solitude in majesty sublime, Through lonely wilds and gorges, by springs among the rocks, The exiled seer, a shepherd, led his roving browsing flocks.

          Most strange! Most queer—although most excellent a change! Shades of the prison-house, ye disappear! My fettered thoughts have won a wider range,           And like my legs, are free; No longer huddled up so pitiably: Free now to pry and probe, and peep and peer,           And make these mysteries out. Shall a free-thinking chicken live in doubt? For now no doubt undoubtedly I am: This problem's very heavy on my mind, And I'm not one to either shirk or sham; I won't be blinded, and I won't be blind.