The Poems of Felicia Hemans
Wo _kein Schnee_ mehr ist.”
Schiller’s _Nadowessiche Todtenklage_.
THE MEMORY OF THE DEAD.
Forget them not!--though now their name
Be but a mournful sound,
Though by the hearth its utterance claim
A stillness round.
Though for their sake this earth no more
As it hath been may be,
And shadows, never mark’d before,
Brood o’er each tree;
And though their image dim the sky,
Yet, yet forget them not!
Nor, where their love and life went by,
Forsake the spot!
They have a breathing influence there,
A charm, not elsewhere found;
Sad--yet it sanctifies the air,
The stream, the ground.
Then, though the wind an alter’d tone
Through the young foliage bear,
Though every flower, of something gone
A tinge may wear;
Oh! fly it not! No _fruitless_ grief,
Thus in their presence felt,
A record links to every leaf
There, where they dwelt.
Still trace the path which knew their tread,
Still tend their garden-bower,
Still commune with the holy dead
In each lone hour!
The _holy_ dead!--oh! bless’d we are,
That we may call them so,
And to their image look afar
Through all our woe!
Bless’d, that the things they loved on earth
As relics we may hold,
That wake sweet thoughts of parted worth
By springs untold!
Bless’d, that a deep and chastening power
Thus o’er our souls is given,
If but to bird, or song, or flower,
Yet all for heaven!
HE WALKED WITH GOD.
GENESIS, V. XXIV.
[“These two little pieces,” (“He walked with God,” and “The Rod
of Aaron,”) says the author in one of her letters, “are part of a
collection I think of forming, to be called Sacred Lyrics. They are
all to be on scriptural subjects, and to go through the most striking
events of the Old Testament, to those far more deeply affecting ones
of the New.” Two others (“The Voice of God” and “The Fountain of
Marah”) are subjoined, as having been probably intended to form a part
of the same series.]
He walk’d with God, in holy joy,
While yet his days were few;
The deep, glad spirit of the boy
To love and reverence grew.
Whether, each nightly star to count,
The ancient hills he trode,
Or sought the flowers by stream and fount--
Alike he walk’d with God.
The graver noon of manhood came,
The full of cares and fears;
One voice was in his heart--the same
It heard through childhood’s years.
Amidst fair tents, and flocks, and swains,
O’er his green pasture-sod,
A shepherd-king on Eastern plains--
The patriarch walk’d with God.
And calmly, brightly, that pure life
Melted from earth away;
No cloud it knew, no parting strife,
No sorrowful decay:
He bow’d him not, like all beside,
Unto the spoiler’s rod,
But join’d at once the glorified,
Where angels walk with God!
So let _us_ walk! The night must come
To us that comes to all;
We through the darkness must go home,
Hearing the trumpet’s call.
Closed is the path for ever more
Which without death he trode;
Not so that way, wherein of yore
His footsteps walk’d with God!
THE ROD OF AARON.
NUMBERS, XVII. VIII.
Was it the sigh of the southern gale
That flush’d the almond bough?
Brightest and first the young spring to hail,
Still its red blossoms glow.
Was it the sunshine that woke its flowers
With a kindling look of love?
Oh! far and deep, and through hidden bowers,
That smile of heaven can rove!
No! from the breeze and the living light
Shut was the sapless rod;
But it felt in the stillness a secret might,
And thrill’d to the breath of God.
E’en so may that breath, like the vernal air,
O’er our glad spirits move;
And all such things as are good and fair
Be the blossoms, its track that prove!
THE VOICE OF GOD.
“I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid.”--Gen. iii. 10.
Amidst the thrilling leaves, Thy voice
At evening’s fall drew near;
Father! and did not man rejoice
That blessed sound to hear?
Did not his heart within him burn,
Touch’d by the solemn tone?
Not so!--for, never to return,
Its purity was gone.
Therefore, midst holy stream and bower,
His spirit shook with dread,
And call’d the cedars, in that hour,
To veil his conscious head.
Oh! in each wind, each fountain-flow,
Each whisper of the shade,
Grant me, my God! thy voice to know,
And not to be afraid!
THE FOUNTAIN OF MARAH.
“And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of
Marah, for they were bitter.
“And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?
“And he cried unto the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree,
which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made
sweet.”--Exodus, xv. 23-25.
Where is the tree the prophet threw
Into the bitter wave?
Left it no scion where it grew,
The thirsting soul to save?
Hath nature lost the hidden power
Its precious foliage shed?
Is there no distant Eastern bower
With such sweet leaves o’erspread?
Nay, wherefore ask?--since gifts are ours
Which yet may well imbue
Earth’s many troubled founts with showers
Of heaven’s own balmy dew.
Oh! mingled with the cup of grief
Let faith’s deep spirit be!
And every prayer shall win a leaf
From that bless’d healing tree!
THE PENITENT’S OFFERING.
ST LUKE, VII. XXXVII.-IX.
Thou that with pallid cheek,
And eyes in sadness meek,
And faded locks that humbly swept the ground,
From thy long wanderings won,
Before the all-healing Son,
Did’st bow thee to the earth--O lost and found!
When thou wouldst bathe his feet
With odours richly sweet,
And many a shower of woman’s burning tear,
And dry them with that hair,
Brought low the dust to wear,
From the crown’d beauty of its festal year.
Did He reject thee then,
While the sharp scorn of men
On thy once bright and stately head was cast?
No! from the Saviour’s mien,
A solemn light serene
Bore to thy soul the peace of God at last.
For thee, their smiles no more
Familiar faces wore;
Voices, once kind, had learn’d the stranger’s tone:
Who raised thee up, and bound
Thy silent spirit’s wound?--
He, from all guilt the stainless, He alone!
But which, O erring child,
From home so long beguiled!--
Which of thine offerings won those words of heaven,
That o’er the bruisèd reed,
Condemn’d of earth to bleed,
In music pass’d, “Thy sins are all forgiven?”
Was it that perfume, fraught
With balm and incense, brought
From the sweet woods of Araby the Blest?
Or that fast-flowing rain
Of tears, which not in vain,
To Him who scorn’d not tears, thy woes confess’d?
No! not by these restored
Unto thy Father’s board,
Thy peace, that kindled joy in heaven, was made;
But, costlier in his eyes,
By that bless’d sacrifice,
Thy heart, thy full deep heart, before Him laid.
THE SCULPTURED CHILDREN.
ON CHANTREY’S MONUMENT IN LICHFIELD CATHEDRAL.
[“The monument by Chantrey in Lichfield Cathedral, to the memory of
the two children of Mrs Robinson, is one of the most affecting works
of art ever executed. He has given a pathos to marble which one who
trusts to his natural feelings, and admires and is touched only at
their bidding, might have thought, from any previous experience,
that it was out of the power of statuary to attain. The monument
is executed with all his beautiful simplicity and truth. The two
children, two little girls, are represented as lying in each other’s
arms, and, at first glance, appear to be sleeping:--
‘But something lies
Too deep and still on those soft-sealed eyes.’
It is while lying in the helplessness of innocent sleep that infancy
and childhood are viewed with the most touching interest; and this,
and the loveliness of the children, the uncertainty of the expression
at first view, the dim shadowing forth of that sleep from which they
cannot be awakened--their hovering, as it were, upon the confines of
life, as if they might still be recalled--all conspire to render the
last feeling, that death is indeed before us, most deeply affecting.
They were the only children of their mother, and she was a widow. A
tablet commemorative of their father hangs over the monument. This
stands at the end of one of the side-aisles of the choir, where there
is nothing to distract the attention from it, or weaken its effect.
It may be contemplated in silence and alone. The inscription, in
that subdued tone of strong feeling which seeks no relief in words,
harmonizes with the character of the whole. It is as follows:--
‘Sacred to the Memory of
Ellen Jane and Marianne, only children
Of the late Rev. William Robinson, and Ellen Jane, his wife,
Their affectionate Mother,
In fond remembrance of their heaven-loved innocence,
Consigns their resemblance to this sanctuary,
In humble gratitude for the glorious assurance
That ‘of such is the kingdom of God.’[394] A. N.”]
Fair images of sleep,
Hallow’d, and soft, and deep,
On whose calm lids the dreamy quiet lies,
Like moonlight on shut bells
Of flowers in mossy dells,
Fill’d with the hush of night and summer skies!
How many hearts have felt
Your silent beauty melt
Their strength to gushing tenderness away!
How many sudden tears,
From depths of buried years
All freshly bursting, having confess’d your sway!
How many eyes will shed
Still, o’er your marble bed,
Such drops from memory’s troubled fountains wrung!
While hope hath blights to bear,
While love breathes mortal air,
While roses perish ere to glory sprung!
Yet from a voiceless home,
If some sad mother come
Fondly to linger o’er your lovely rest,
As o’er the cheek’s warm glow,
And the sweet breathings low,
Of babes that grew and faded on her breast;
If then the dove-like tone
Of those faint murmurs gone,
O’er her sick sense too piercingly return;
If for the soft bright hair,
And brow and bosom fair,
And life, now dust, her soul too deeply yearn;
O gentle forms, entwined
Like tendrils, which the wind
May wave, so clasp’d, but never can unlink!
Send from your calm profound
A still, small voice--a sound
Of hope, forbidding that lone heart to sink!
By all the pure, meek mind
In your pale beauty shrined,
By childhood’s love--too bright a bloom to die
O’er her worn spirit shed,
O fairest, holiest dead!
The faith, trust, joy, of immortality!
[394] From _The Offering_, an American annual.
WOMAN AND FAME.
Thou hast a charmèd cup, O Fame!
A draught that mantles high,
And seems to lift this earthly frame
Above mortality.
Away! to me--a woman--bring
Sweet waters from affection’s spring!
Thou hast green laurel leaves, that twine
Into so proud a wreath,
For that resplendent gift of thine
Heroes have smiled in death:
Give _me_ from some kind hand a flower,