All heaven bursts her starry floors,
And strews her lights below,
And deepens on and up! the gates
Roll back, and far within
For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits,
To make me pure of sin.
The sabbaths of Eternity,
One sabbath deep and wide—
A light upon the shining sea—
The Bridegroom with His bride!
'Tis morning; and the sun, with ruddy orb
Ascending, fires the horizon; while the clouds,
That crowd away before the driving wind,
More ardent as the disk emerges more,
Resemble most some city in a blaze,
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray
Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale,
And tinging all with his own rosy hue,
From every herb and every spiry blade
Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field.
The verdure of the plain lies buried deep
Beneath the drizzling deluge; and the bents
And coarser grass, upspearing o'er the rest,
Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine
Conspicuous, and in bright apparel clad,
And fledged with icy feathers, nod superb.
The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence
Screens them, and seem half-petrified to sleep
In unrecumbent sadness. There they wait
Their wonted fodder; not like hungering man,
Fretful if unsupplied; but silent, meek,
And patient of the slow-paced swain's delay.
Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcerned
The cheerful haunts of man; to wield the axe
And drive the wedge in yonder forest drear,
From morn to eve his solitary task.
Shaggy, and lean, and shrewd, with pointed ears
And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur,
His dog attends him. Close behind his heel
Now creeps he slow, and now with many a frisk
Wide scampering, snatches up the drifted snow
With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout ;
Then shakes his powdered coat, and barks for joy.
Heedless of all his pranks, the sturdy churl
Moves right toward the mark; nor stops for aught
But now and then with pressure of his thumb
To adjust the fragrant charge of a short tube,
That fumes beneath his nose: the trailing cloud
Streams far behind him, scenting all the air.
Now from the roost, or from the neighbouring pale,
Where, diligent to catch the first fair gleam.
Of smiling day, they gossipped side by side,
Come trooping at the housewife's well-known call
The feathered tribes domestic. Half on wing,
And half on foot, they brush the fleecy flood,
Conscious, and fearful of too deep a plunge.
The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves,
To seize the fair occasion: well they eye
The scattered grain, and thievishly resolved.
To escape the impending famine, often scared
As oft return, a pert voracious kind.
Clean riddance quickly made, one only care
Remains to each, the search of sunny nook,
Or shed impervious to the blast.
WHEN Winter winds are piercing chill,
And through the hawthorn blows the gale, With solemn feet I tread the hill
That overbrows the lonely vale.
O'er the bare upland and away
Through the long reach of desert woods, The embracing sunbeams chastely play And gladden these deep solitudes.
Where, twisted round the barren oak,
The Summer vine in beauty clung,
And Summer winds the stillness broke-
The crystal icicle is hung.
Where, from their frozen urns, mute springs Pour out the river's gradual tide,
Shrilly the skater's iron rings,
And voices fill the woodland side.
Alas! how changed from the fair scene
When birds sang out their mellow lay, And winds were soft, and woods were green, And the song ceased not with the day.
But still, wild music is abroad,
Pale, desert woods! within your crowd; And gathering winds, in hoarse accord, Amid the vocal reeds pipe loud.
"For so He giveth His beloved sleep."- Psalm cxxvii. 2.
AH! why reposest thou so pale,
So very still in thy white veil,
Thou cherished Fatherland?
Where are the joyous lays of Spring,
The varied hue of Summer's wing,
Thy glowing vestment bland?
But half-attired, thou slumberest now,
No flocks to seek thy pastures go,
O'er vales or mountains steep;
Silent is every warbler's lay,
No more the bee hums through the day,
Yet art thou fair in sleep.
On all thy trees, on every bough,
Thousands of crystals sparkle now,
Where'er our eyes alight;
Firm on the spotless robe we tread,
Which o'er thy beauteous form is spread,
With glittering hoar-frost bright.
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