Page:Fugitive Poetry 1600-1878.djvu/196
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178
MORNING.
Summer, although perpetually she wears
Her spangled vest, nor shades her brows with frowns,
Can never be esteemed
As, social Winter, thou.
Her spangled vest, nor shades her brows with frowns,
Can never be esteemed
As, social Winter, thou.
Winter Makes Spring.
Mantled in storms;—attended by the roar
Of whirling winds, and flight of showery snows,
Dread Winter comes, and all around him throws
Wide desolation. From his northern store
Tempests of hail, and dark-robed thunders pour.
The gurgling rivulet no longer flows
When he with icy breath upon it blows:
The naked trees and shrubs look gay no more.
Shall Winter rage for ever? No! the sound
Of his rude car shall rouse the slumbering Spring;
Beneath the kindling sun, the verdant ground
Shall bloom again; the groves with music ring.
Child of distress!—when life's black storms are fled,
The rays of heavenly Spring shall crown thy head.
Of whirling winds, and flight of showery snows,
Dread Winter comes, and all around him throws
Wide desolation. From his northern store
Tempests of hail, and dark-robed thunders pour.
The gurgling rivulet no longer flows
When he with icy breath upon it blows:
The naked trees and shrubs look gay no more.
Shall Winter rage for ever? No! the sound
Of his rude car shall rouse the slumbering Spring;
Beneath the kindling sun, the verdant ground
Shall bloom again; the groves with music ring.
Child of distress!—when life's black storms are fled,
The rays of heavenly Spring shall crown thy head.
Morning.
There is a parting in night's murky veil,
A soft pale light is in the eastern sky;
It steals along the ocean tremblingly,
Like distant music wafted on the gale.
Stars, one by one, grow faint, and disappear,
Like waning tapers, when the feast is o'er;
While, girt with rolling mists, the mountains hoar,
High o'er the darkling glens their tops appear.
There is a gentle rustling in the grove,
Though winds be hushed: it is the stir of wings,
And now the skylark from the nest upsprings,
Trilling, in accents clear, her song of love;
And now heaven's gate in golden splendour burns—
Joy to the earth, the glorious sun returns.
A soft pale light is in the eastern sky;
It steals along the ocean tremblingly,
Like distant music wafted on the gale.
Stars, one by one, grow faint, and disappear,
Like waning tapers, when the feast is o'er;
While, girt with rolling mists, the mountains hoar,
High o'er the darkling glens their tops appear.
There is a gentle rustling in the grove,
Though winds be hushed: it is the stir of wings,
And now the skylark from the nest upsprings,
Trilling, in accents clear, her song of love;
And now heaven's gate in golden splendour burns—
Joy to the earth, the glorious sun returns.