The Poems of Felicia Hemans

Guarded by swords of fire?[343] a hidden spring, A fabled fruit, that I should thus endure, As if the world within me held no cure? Wherefore not spread free wings----Heaven, heaven! control These thoughts!--they rush--I look into my soul As down a gulf, and tremble at the array Of fierce forms crowding it! Give strength to pray! So shall their dark host pass. The storm is still’d. Father in Heaven! thou, only thou, canst sound The heart’s great deep, with floods of anguish fill’d, For human line too fearfully profound. Therefore, forgive, my Father! if thy child, Rock’d on its heaving darkness, hath grown wild, And sinn’d in her despair! It well may be That thou wouldst lead my spirit back to thee, By the crush’d hope too long on this world pour’d-- The stricken love which hath perchance adored A mortal in thy place! Now let me strive With thy strong arm no more! Forgive, forgive! Take me to peace! And peace at last is nigh. A sign is on my brow, a token sent Th’ o’erwearied dust from home: no breeze flits by, But calls me with a strange sweet whisper, blent Of many mysteries. Hark! the warning tone Deepens--its word is _Death_! Alone, alone, And sad in youth, but chasten’d, I depart, Bowing to heaven. Yet, yet my woman’s heart Shall wake a spirit and a power to bless, Even in this hour’s o’ershadowing fearfulness, Thee, its first love! O tender still, and true! Be it forgotten if mine anguish threw Drops from its bitter fountain on thy name, Though but a moment! Now, with fainting frame, With soul just lingering on the flight begun, To bind for thee its last dim thoughts in one, I bless thee! Peace be on thy noble head, Years of bright fame, when I am with the dead! I bid this prayer survive me, and retain Its might, again to bless thee, and again! Thou hast been gather’d into my dark fate Too much; too long, for my sake, desolate Hath been thine exiled youth: but now take back, From dying hands, thy freedom, and retrack (After a few kind tears for her whose days Went out in dreams of thee) the sunny ways Of hope, and find thou happiness! Yet send Even then, in silent hours, a thought, dear friend! Down to my voiceless chamber; for thy love Hath been to me all gifts of earth above, Though bought with burning tears! It is the sting Of death to leave that vainly-precious thing In this cold world! What were it, then, if thou, With thy fond eyes, wert gazing on me now? Too keen a pang! Farewell! and yet once more, Farewell! The passion of long years I pour Into that word! Thou hear’st not--but the woe And fervour of its tones may one day flow To thy heart’s holy place: there let them dwell. We shall o’ersweep the grave to meet. Farewell! [342] “Wheresoever you are, or in what state soever you be, it sufficeth me you are mine. _Rachel wept and would not be comforted, because her children were no more._ And that indeed, is the remediless sorrow, and none else!”--From a letter of Arabella Stuart’s to her husband.--See _Curiosities of Literature_. [343] “And if you remember of old, _I dare die_. Consider what the world would conceive if I should be violently enforced to do it.”--_Fragments of her Letters._ THE BRIDE OF THE GREEK ISLE.[344] “Fear! I’m a Greek, and how should I fear death? A slave, and wherefore should I dread my freedom? ... I will not live degraded.” Sardanapalus. Come from the woods with the citron-flowers, Come with your lyres for the festal hours, Maids of bright Scio! They came, and the breeze Bore their sweet songs o’er the Grecian seas; They came, and Eudora stood robed and crown’d, The bride of the morn, with her train around. Jewels flash’d out from her braided hair, Like starry dews midst the roses there; Pearls on her bosom quivering shone, Heaved by her heart through its golden zone. But a brow, as those gems of the ocean pale, Gleam’d from beneath her transparent veil; Changeful and faint was her fair cheek’s hue, Though clear as a flower which the light looks through; And the glance of her dark resplendent eye, For the aspect of woman at times too high, Lay floating in mists, which the troubled stream Of the soul sent up o’er its fervid beam. She look’d on the vine at her father’s door, Like one that is leaving his native shore; She hung o’er the myrtle once call’d her own, As it greenly waved by the threshold stone; She turn’d--and her mother’s gaze brought back Each hue of her childhood’s faded track. Oh! hush the song, and let her tears Flow to the dream of her early years! Holy and pure are the drops that fall When the young bride goes from her father’s hall; She goes unto love yet untried and new, She parts from love which hath still been true: Mute be the song and the choral strain, Till her heart’s deep well-spring is clear again! She wept on her mother’s faithful breast, Like a babe that sobs itself to rest; She wept--yet laid her hand awhile In _his_ that waited her dawning smile-- Her soul’s affianced, nor cherish’d less For the gush of nature’s tenderness! She lifted her graceful head at last-- The choking swell of her heart was past; And her lovely thoughts from their cells found way In the sudden flow of a plaintive lay.[345] THE BRIDE’S FAREWELL. Why do I weep? To leave the vine Whose clusters o’er me bend; The myrtle--yet, oh call it mine!-- The flowers I loved to tend. A thousand thoughts of all things dear Like shadows o’er me sweep; I leave my sunny childhood here, Oh! therefore let me weep! I leave thee, sister! We have play’d Through many a joyous hour, Where the silvery green of the olive shade Hung dim o’er fount and bower. Yes! thou and I, by stream, by shore, In song, in prayer, in sleep, Have been as we may be no more-- Kind sister, let me weep! I leave thee, father! Eve’s bright moon Must now light other feet, With the gather’d grapes, and the lyre in tune, Thy homeward step to greet. Thou in whose voice, to bless thy child, Lay tones of love so deep, Whose eye o’er all my youth hath smiled-- I leave thee! let me weep! Mother! I leave thee! On thy breast Pouring out joy and woe, I have found that holy place of rest Still changeless--yet I go! Lips, that have lull’d me with your strain! Eyes, that have watch’d my sleep! Will earth give love like _yours_ again?-- Sweet mother! let me weep! And like a slight young tree, that throws The weight of rain from its drooping boughs, Once more she wept. But a changeful thing Is the human heart--as a mountain spring That works its way, through the torrent’s foam, To the bright pool near it, the lily’s home! It is well!--The cloud on her soul that lay, Hath melted in glittering drops away. Wake again, mingle, sweet flute and lyre! She turns to her lover, she leaves her sire. Mother! on earth it must still be so: Thou rearest the lovely to see them go! They are moving onward, the bridal throng, Ye may track their way by the swells of song; Ye may catch through the foliage their white robes’ gleam, Like a swan midst the reeds of a shadowy stream; Their arms bear up garlands, their gliding tread Is over the deep-vein’d violet’s bed; They have light leaves around them, blue skies above, An arch for the triumph of youth and love! II. Still and sweet was the home that stood In the flowering depths of a Grecian wood, With the soft green light o’er its low roof spread, As if from the glow of an emerald shed, Pouring through lime-leaves that mingled on high, Asleep in the silence of noon’s clear sky. Citrons amidst their dark foliage glow’d, Making a gleam round the lone abode; Laurels o’erhung it, whose faintest shiver Scatter’d out rays like a glancing river; Stars of the jasmine its pillars crown’d, Vine-stalks its lattice and walls had bound; And brightly before it a fountain’s play Flung showers through a thicket of glossy bay, To a cypress which rose in that flashing rain, Like one tall shaft of some fallen fane. And thither Ianthis had brought his bride, And the guests were met by that fountain side. They lifted the veil from Eudora’s face-- It smiled out softly in pensive grace, With lips of love, and a brow serene, Meet for the soul of the deep wood-scene. Bring wine, bring odours!--the board is spread; Bring roses! a chaplet for every head! The wine-cups foam’d, and the rose was shower’d On the young and fair from the world embower’d; The sun look’d not on them in that sweet shade, The winds amid scented boughs were laid; And there came by fits, through some wavy tree, A sound and a gleam of the moaning sea. Hush! be still! Was that no more Than the murmur from the shore? Silence!--did thick rain-drops beat On the grass like trampling feet? Fling down the goblet, and draw the sword! The groves are fill’d with a pirate horde! Through the dim olives their sabres shine!-- Now must the red blood stream for wine! The youths from the banquet to battle sprang, The woods with the shriek of the maidens rang; Under the golden-fruited boughs There were flashing poniards and darkening brows-- Footsteps, o’er garland and lyre that fled, And the dying soon on a greensward bed. Eudora, Eudora! _thou_ dost not fly!-- She saw but Ianthis before her lie, With the blood from his breast in a gushing flow, Like a child’s large tears in its hour of woe, And a gathering film in his lifted eye, That sought his young bride out mournfully. She knelt down beside him--her arms she wound Like tendrils, his drooping neck around, As if the passion of that fond grasp Might chain in life with its ivy-clasp. But they tore her thence in her wild despair, The sea’s fierce rovers--they left him there: They left to the fountain a dark-red vein, And on the wet violets a pile of slain, And a hush of fear through the summer grove.-- So closed the triumph of youth and love! III. Gloomy lay the shore that night, When the moon, with sleeping light, Bathed each purple Sciote hill-- Gloomy lay the shore, and still. O’er the wave no gay guitar Sent its floating music far; No glad sound of dancing feet Woke the starry hours to greet. But a voice of mortal woe, In its changes wild or low, Through the midnight’s blue repose, From the sea-beat rocks arose, As Eudora’s mother stood Gazing o’er th’ Ægean flood, With a fix’d and straining eye-- Oh! was the spoilers’ vessel nigh? Yes! there, becalm’d in silent sleep, Dark and alone on a breathless deep, On a sea of molten silver, dark Brooding it frown’d, that evil bark! There its broad pennon a shadow cast, Moveless and black from the tall still mast; And the heavy sound of its flapping sail