Ne’er have I sung in idle hours of dreaming,
With verse harmonious and sweet-voiced rhyme,
I have sung only when in tempest raging
My soul was shaken by a power sublime! 
For each thought I have suffered and been troubled,
No dream creation painless from me torn,
The blessed lot of Poet not seldom seeming
A cross intolerable to be borne! 
Oft have I sworn to evermore keep silence,
To mingle and be lost among the crowd,
But when the winds once more their strings are sweeping—­
Aeolian harps must ever cry aloud;
And in the Spring the flooding streams on-rushing
Must downward plunge into the vale below,
When from the rocky peaks’ high towering summits
The sun’s warm rays have melted off the snow.

NADSON.

TO THE MUSE

Take from thy brow the laurel—­cast it forth! 
  May it in dust lie ’neath thy feet;
The blood-flecked thorn crown hurl away—­
  As witness of thy pain alone ’tis meet!

NADSON.

A FRAGMENT

Hark!  The storm petrel shrieks! 
                      Reef the sail canvas fast! 
See, the Spirit of Storm with wildest commotion
Has to heaven’s arched vaulting his coronal pressed,
While his heels dam the flood gates of ocean! 
Furious storm-cloud his undulent drapery,
Girded round with the lightning wide flashing;
O’er the sea’s leaden billows from his threatening hand
The thunderbolts are sent crashing!

NADSON.

IN MAY

To you,—­you beggars in the forests proud,—­
To pastures free, my hasting foot returns! 
The May is come!  It smiles and laughs aloud—­
For Love’s desire, freedom’s bliss, it yearns. 
Erased the marks of city slavery,
Here where the sun gleams gold through azure hours—­
Here wrests the spirit from all bondage free,
The fields grown green and the syringa flowers!

Storms only, brought my youthful morning red,
And night of soul and wilderness of pains—­
All in my breast is hushed and numb and dead,
The pulsing fever stopped within my veins;
Yet here, where Nature winds a wreath for me,
The arms stretch forth,—­the weary glance devours—­
And the arrested soul exults and sings,
The fields grow green and the syringa flowers!

NADSON.

IN MEMORY OF N.M.D.

Slumber soft,—­oh thou my heart’s beloved! 
Death alone can bring eternal rest,
And in death alone ’neath tearless lashes
Shall thine eyes forever close be pressed;
In thy grave, no more with fevered doubting
Shall thy golden head tormented be,
In thy grave alone, thou’lt never long for
All that life so cruel robbed from thee.

Through the grass, white yet thy coffin shining—­
O’er thy grave the cross is looming white,
As in silent prayer unto the heavens
Mournful gleaming through the cold blue night. 
Now with tears my eyes are overflowing,
Hotter tears I ne’er before have wept—­
All the bitter sorrows I have suffered
In one sobbing cry together swept.