The Poems of Felicia Hemans

Thither I go. There will my sisters be, And the dead parents, lisping at whose knee My childhood’s prayer was learn’d--the Saviour’s prayer Which now _ye_ know--and I shall meet you there. Father and gentle mother! ye have bound The bruisèd reed, and mercy shall be found By Mercy’s children.” From the matron’s eye Dropp’d tears, her sole and passionate reply. But Edith felt them not; for now a sleep Solemnly beautiful--a stillness deep, Fell on her settled face. Then, sad and slow, And mantling up his stately head in woe, “Thou’rt passing hence,” he sang, that warrior old, In sounds like those by plaintive waters roll’d. “Thou’rt passing from the lake’s green side, And the hunter’s hearth away: For the time of flowers, for the summer’s pride, Daughter! thou canst not stay. “Thou’rt journeying to thy spirit’s home, Where the skies are ever clear: The corn-month’s golden hours will come, But they shall not find thee here. “And we shall miss thy voice, my bird! Under our whispering pine; Music shall midst the leaves be heard, But not a song like thine. “A breeze that roves o’er stream and hill, Telling of winter gone, Hath such sweet falls--yet caught we still A farewell in its tone. “But thou, my bright one! thou shalt be Where farewell sounds are o’er; Thou, in the eyes thou lovest, shalt see No fear of parting more. “The mossy grave thy tears have wet, And the wind’s wild moanings by, Thou with thy kindred shalt forget, Midst flowers--not such as die. “The shadow from thy brow shall melt The sorrow from thy strain, But where thine earthly smile hath dwelt Our hearts shall thirst in vain. “Dim will our cabin be, and lone, When thou, its light, art fled; Yet hath thy step the pathway shown Unto the happy dead. “And we will follow thee, our guide! And join that shining band; Thou’rt passing from the lake’s green side-- Go to the better land!” The song had ceased, the list’ners caught no breath: That lovely sleep had melted into death. [347] Founded on incidents related in an American work, “Sketches of Connecticut.” THE INDIAN CITY.[348] “What deep wounds ever closed without a sear? The heart’s bleed longest, and but heal to wear That which disfigures it.” Childe Harold. [348] From a tale in Forbes’s _Oriental Memoirs_. I. Royal in splendour went down the day On the plain where an Indian city lay, With its crown of domes o’er the forest high, Red, as if fused in the burning sky; And its deep groves pierced by the rays which made A bright stream’s way through each long arcade, Till the pillar’d vaults of the banian stood Like torch-lit aisles midst the solemn wood; And the plantain glitter’d with leaves of gold, As a tree midst the genii gardens old, And the cypress lifted a blazing spire, And the stems of the cocoas were shafts of fire. Many a white pagoda’s gleam Slept lovely round upon lake and stream, Broken alone by the lotus flowers, As they caught the glow of the sun’s last hours, Like rosy wine in their cups, and shed Its glory forth on their crystal bed. Many a graceful Hindoo maid, With the water-vase from the palmy shade, Came gliding light as the desert’s roe, Down marble steps, to the tanks below; And a cool sweet plashing was ever heard, As the molten glass of the wave was stirr’d, And a murmur, thrilling the scented air, Told where the Bramin bow’d in prayer. --There wander’d a noble Moslem boy Through the scene of beauty in breathless joy; He gazed where the stately city rose, Like a pageant of clouds, in its red repose; He turn’d where birds through the gorgeous gloom Of the woods went glancing on starry plume; He track’d the brink of the shining lake, By the tall canes feather’d in tuft and brake; Till the path he chose, in its mazes, wound To the very heart of the holy ground. And there lay the water, as if enshrined In a rocky urn, from the sun and wind, Bearing the hues of the grove on high, Far down through its dark still purity. The flood beyond, to the fiery west, Spread out like a metal mirror’s breast; But that lone bay, in its dimness deep, Seem’d made for the swimmer’s joyous leap, For the stag athirst from the noontide chase, For all free things of the wild wood’s race. Like a falcon’s glance on the wide blue sky, Was the kindling flash of the boy’s glad eye; Like a sea-bird’s flight to the foaming wave, From the shadowy bank was the bound he gave; Dashing the spray-drops, cold and white, O’er the glossy leaves in its young delight, And bowing his locks to the waters clear-- Alas! he dreamt not that fate was near. His mother look’d from her tent the while, O’er heaven and earth with a quiet smile: She, on her way unto Mecca’s fane, Had stay’d the march of her pilgrim train, Calmly to linger a few brief hours In the Bramin city’s glorious bowers; For the pomp of the forest, the wave’s bright fall, The red gold of sunset--she loved them all. II. The moon rose clear in the splendour given To the deep-blue night of an Indian heaven; The boy from the high-arch’d woods came back-- Oh! what had he met in his lonely track? The serpent’s glance, through the long reeds bright? The arrowy spring of the tiger’s might? No! yet as one by a conflict worn, With his graceful hair all soil’d and torn, And a gloom on the lids of his darken’d eye, And a gash on his bosom--he came to die! He look’d for the face to his young heart sweet, And found it, and sank at his mother’s feet. “Speak to me! whence doth the swift blood run What hath befallen thee, my child, my son?” The mist of death on his brow lay pale, But his voice just linger’d to breathe the tale, Murmuring faintly of wrongs and scorn, And wounds from the children of Brahma borne This was the doom for a Moslem found With a foot profane on their holy ground-- This was for sullying the pure waves, free Unto them alone--’twas their god’s decree. A change came o’er his wandering look-- The mother shriek’d not then nor shook: Breathless she knelt in her son’s young blood, Rending her mantle to stanch its flood; But it rush’d like a river which none may stay, Bearing a flower to the deep away. That which our love to the earth would chain, Fearfully striving with heaven in vain-- That which fades from us, while yet we hold, Clasp’d to our bosoms, its mortal mould, Was fleeting before her, afar and fast; One moment--the soul from the face had pass’d! Are there no words for that common woe? Ask of the thousands its depth that know! The boy had breathed, in his dreaming rest, Like a low-voiced dove, on her gentle breast; He had stood, when she sorrow’d, beside her knee, Painfully stilling his quick heart’s glee; He had kiss’d from her cheek the widow’s tears, With the loving lip of his infant years: He had smiled o’er her path like a bright spring day-- Now in his blood on the earth he lay! _Murder’d!_ Alas! and we love so well In a world where anguish like this can dwell! She bow’d down mutely o’er her dead-- They that stood round her watch’d in dread; They watch’d--she knew not they were by-- Her soul sat veil’d in its agony. On the silent lip she press’d no kiss-- Too stern was the grasp of her pangs for this: She shed no tear, as her face bent low O’er the shining hair of the lifeless brow; She look’d but into the half-shut eye With a gaze that found there no reply, And, shrieking, mantled her head from sight, And fell, struck down by her sorrow’s might. And what deep change, what work of power, Was wrought on her secret soul that hour? How rose the lonely one? She rose Like a prophetess from dark repose! And proudly flung from her face the veil, And shook the hair from her forehead pale, And midst her wondering handmaids stood, With the sudden glance of a dauntless mood-- Ay, lifting up to the midnight sky A brow in its regal passion high, With a close and rigid grasp she press’d The blood-stain’d robe to her heaving breast, And said--“Not yet, not yet I weep, Not yet my spirit shall sink or sleep! Not till yon city, in ruins rent, Be piled for its victim’s monument. Cover his dust! bear it on before! It shall visit those temple gates once more.” And away in the train of the dead she turn’d, The strength of her step was the heart that burn’d; And the Bramin groves in the starlight smiled, As the mother pass’d with her slaughter’d child. III. Hark! a wild sound of the desert’s horn Through the woods round the Indian city borne, A peal of the cymbal and tambour afar-- War! ’tis the gathering of Moslem war! The Bramin look’d from the leaguer’d towers-- He saw the wild archer amidst his bowers; And the lake that flash’d through the plantain shade, As the light of the lances along it play’d; And the canes that shook as if winds were high, When the fiery steed of the waste swept by; And the camp as it lay like a billowy sea, Wide round the sheltering banian-tree. There stood one tent from the rest apart-- That was the place of a wounded heart. Oh! deep is a wounded heart, and strong A voice that cries against mighty wrong; And full of death as a hot wind’s blight, Doth the ire of a crush’d affection light. Maimuna from realm to realm had pass’d, And her tale had rung like a trumpet’s blast. There had been words from her pale lips pour’d, Each one a spell to unsheath the sword. The Tartar had sprung from his steed to hear, And the dark chief of Araby grasp’d his spear, Till a chain of long lances begirt the wall, And a vow was recorded that doom’d its fall. Back with the dust of her son she came, When her voice had kindled that lightning flame; She came in the might of a queenly foe, Banner, and javelin, and bended bow; But a deeper power on her forehead sate-- _There_ sought the warrior his star of fate: Her eye’s wild flash through the tented line Was hail’d as a spirit and a sign, And the faintest tone from her lip was caught As a sibyl’s breath of prophetic thought. Vain, bitter glory!--the gift of grief, That lights up vengeance to find relief, Transient and faithless! It cannot fill So the deep void of the heart, nor still The yearning left by a broken tie, That haunted fever of which we die! Sickening she turn’d from her sad renown, As a king in death might reject his crown. Slowly the strength of the walls gave way-- _She_ wither’d faster from day to day: All the proud sounds of that banner’d plain, To stay the flight of her soul were vain; Like an eagle caged, it had striven, and worn The frail dust, ne’er for such conflicts born, Till the bars were rent, and the hour was come For its fearful rushing through darkness home. The bright sun set in his pomp and pride,