THE Bardling came where by a Atoning what to men mad discord

There whippoorwills plain in the Ah, too pure a mirror

But a tiny sand-pillar

From the bottom keeps jetting,
And mermaid ne'er sounded
Through the wreaths of a shell,
Down amid crimson dulses
In some cavern of ocean,
A melody sweeter
Than the delicate pulses,
The soft, noiseless metre,
The pause and the swell
Of that musical motion:
I recall it, not see it;
Could vision be clearer ?
Half I'm fain to draw nearer
Half tempted to flee it;
The sleeping Past wake not,
Beware!

One forward step take not,
Ah! break not
That quietude rare!

By my step unaffrighted

A thrush hops before it,
And o'er it

A birch hangs delighted,

120

130

One look,

then away!

O magical glass!

Canst keep in thy bosom
Shades of leaf and of blossom
When summer days pass,

So that when thy wave hardens
It shapes as it pleases,
Unharmed by the breezes,
Its fine hanging gardens?
Hast those in thy keeping,
And canst not uncover,
Enchantedly sleeping,
The old shade of thy lover?
It is there! I have found it!
He wakes, the long sleeper!
The pool is grown deeper,
The sand dance is ending,
The white floor sinks, blending
With skies that below me
Are deepening and bending,
And a child's face alone
That seems not to know me,
With hair that fades golden
In the heaven-glow round it,

Dipping, dipping, dipping its trem- Looks up at my own;

ulous hair;

Ah, glimpse through the portal
That leads to the throne,
That opes the child's olden
Regions Elysian!
Ah, too holy vision

For thy skirts to be holden
By soiled hand of mortal!
It wavers, it scatters,
'T is gone past recalling!
A tear's sudden falling

The magic cup shatters,

Breaks the spell of the waters,
And the sand cone once more,
With a ceaseless renewing,

Its dance is pursuing

On the silvery floor,

O'er and o'er,

160

170

180

190

Into the desert, never to return, Against whose life the bow of My one black thought shall ride

Who flies, and hath not where to First-born, for whom by day and

I come to thee for shelter and for Balanced and just are all of God's

THE DARKENED MIND

Strange it is that, in this open brightness,

THE fire is burning clear and Thou shouldst sit in such a narrow

cell;

blithely, Pleasantly whistles the winter Strange it is that thou shouldst be

so lonesome

wind; We are about thee, thy friends and Where those are who love thee all

so well;

kindred, On us all flickers the firelight Not so much of thee is left among

We can speak to thee, and thou As Princes of the Chariot know.

canst answer,

Like two prisoners through a wall 'T were glorious, no doubt, to be of stone. One of the strong-winged Hierarchy.

Hardest heart would call it very To burn with Seraphs, or to shine awful With Cherubs, deathlessly divine; When thou look'st at us and seest Yet I, perhaps, poor earthly clod, - oh, what? Could I forget myself in God, If we move away, thou sittest gaz- Could I but find my nature's clue ing Simply as birds and blossoms do, With those vague eyes at the self- And but for one rapt moment know 'Tis Heaven must come, not we must go,

same spot,

And thou mutterest, thy hands thou wringest,

Seeing something,-us thou seest

not.

Should win my place as near the throne

As the pearl-angel of its zone.