On each side shrinks the bowery shade; Before me spreads an emerald glade; The sunshine steeps its grass and moss, That couch my footsteps as I cross; Merrily hums the tawny bee, The glittering humming-bird I see; Floats the bright butterfly along, The insect choir is loud in song: A spot of light and life, it seems A fairy haunt for fancy dreams.
Here stretch'd, the pleasant turf I press, In luxury of idleness;
Sun-streaks, and glancing wings, and sky, Spotted with cloud-shapes, charm my eye; While murmuring grass, and waving trees, Their leaf-harps sounding to the breeze, And water-tones that tinkle near, Blend their sweet music to my ear; And by the changing shades alone The passage of the hours is known.
A SABLE pall of sky-the billowy hills, Swathed in the snowy robe that winter throws So kindly over nature-skeleton trees, Fringed with rich silver drapery, and the stream Numb in its frosty chains. Yon rustic bridge Bristles with icicles; beneath it stand
The cattle-group, long pausing while they drink From the ice-hollow'd pools, that skim in sheets Of delicate glass, and shivering as the air [trunks, Cuts with keen, stinging edge; and those gaunt Bending with ragged branches o'er the bank, Seem, with their mocking scarfs of chilling white, Mourning for the green grass and fragrant flowers, That summer mirrors in the rippling flow Of the bright stream beneath them. Shrub and rock Are carved in pearl, and the dense thicket shows Clusters of purest ivory. Comfortless The frozen scene, yet not all desolate. Where slopes, by tree and bush, the beaten track, The sleigh glides merrily with prancing steeds, And the low homestead, nestling by its grove, Clings to the leaning hill. The drenching rain Had fallen, and then the large, loose flakes had shower'd,
Quick freezing where they lit; and thus the scene, By winter's alchymy, from gleaming steel Was changed to sparkling silver. Yet, though bright And rich, the landscape smiles with lovelier look When summer gladdens it. The fresh, blue sky Bends like Gon's blessing o'er; the scented air Echoes with bird-songs, and the emerald grass Is dappled with quick shadows; the light wing Of the soft west makes music in the leaves; The ripples murmur as they dance along; The thicket by the road-side casts its cool Black breadth of shade across the heated dust. The cattle seek the pools beneath the banks, Where sport the gnat-swarms, glancing in the sun, Gray, whirling specks, and darts the dragon-fly, A gold-green arrow; and the wandering flock Nibble the short, thick sward that clothes the brink, Down sloping to the waters. Kindly tones
And happy faces make the homestead walls A paradise. Upon the mossy roof The tame dove coos and bows; beneath the eaves The swallow frames her nest; the social wren Lights on the flower-lined paling, and trills through Its noisy gamut; the humming-bird
Shoots, with that flying harp, the honey-bee, Mid the trail'd honeysuckle's trumpet-bloom; Sunset wreathes gorgeous shapes within the west, │ To eyes that love the splendour; morning wakes Light hearts to joyous tasks; and when deep night Breathes o'er the earth a solemn solitude, With stars for watchers, or the holy moon, A sentinel upon the steeps of heaven, Smooth pillows yield their balm to prayer and trust, And slumber, that sweet medicine of toil, Sheds her soft dews and weaves her golden dreams.
THE SETTLER.
His echoing axe the settler swung
Amid the sea-like solitude,
And, rushing, thundering, down we.e flung The Titans of the wood;
Loud shriek'd the eagle, as he dash'd From out his mossy nest, which crash'd With its supporting bough,
And the first sunlight, leaping, flash'd
On the wolf's haunt below.
Rude was the garb, and strong the frame
Of him who plied his ceaseless toil: To form that garb the wild-wood game Contributed their spoil;
The soul that warm'd that frame disdain'd The tinsel, gaud, and glare, that reign'd Where men their crowds collect; The simple fur, untrimm'd, unstain'd, This forest-tamer deck'd.
The paths which wound mid gorgeous trees, The stream whose bright lips kiss'd their flowers, The winds that swell'd their harmonies
Through those sun-hiding bowers, The temple vast, the green arcade, The nestling vale, the grassy glade,
Dark cave, and swampy lair: These scenes and sounds majestic, made His world, his pleasures, there. His roof adorn'd a pleasant spot,
Mid the black logs green glow'd the grain, And herbs and plants the woods knew not, Throve in the sun and rain.
The smoke-wreath curling o'er the dell, The low, the bleat, the tinkling bell, All made a landscape strange, Which was the living chronicle
Of deeds that wrought the change. The violet sprung at spring's first tinge,
The rose of summer spread its glow, The maize hung out its autumn fringe,
Rude winter brought his snow; And still the lone one labour'd there, His shout and whistle broke the air, As cheerily he plied His garden-spade, or drove his share Along the hillock's side.
He mark'd the fire-storm's blazing flood
Roaring and crackling on its path, And scorching earth, and melting wood, Beneath its greedy wrath;
He mark'd the rapid whirlwind shoot, Trampling the pine tree with its foot,
And darkening thick the day With streaming bough and sever'd root,
Hurl'd whizzing on its way.
His gaunt hound yell'd, his rifle flash'd, The grim bear hush'd his savage growl; In blood and foam the panther gnash'd His fangs, with dying howl;
The fleet deer ceased its flying bound, Its snarling wolf-foe bit the ground,
And, with its moaning cry,
The beaver sank beneath the wound
Its pond-built Venice by.
Humble the lot, yet his the race,
When Liberty sent forth her cry, Who throng'd in conflict's deadliest place, To fight-to bleed-to die! Who cumber'd Bunker's height of red, By hope through weary years were led, And witness'd York Town's sun Blaze on a nation's banner spread, A nation's freedom won.
AN AMERICAN FOREST IN SPRING.
Now fluttering breeze, now stormy blast, Mild rain, then blustering snow: Winter's stern, fettering cold is past,
But, sweet Spring! where art thou? The white cloud floats mid smiling blue, The broad, bright sunshine's golden hue Bathes the still frozen earth: "Tis changed! above, black vapours roll: We turn from our expected stroll,
And seek the blazing hearth. Hark! that sweet carol! with delight
We leave the stifling room! The little blue-bird greets our sight,
Spring, glorious Spring, has come! The south wind's balm is in the air, The melting snow-wreaths everywhere Are leaping off in showers;
And Nature, in her brightening looks, Tells that her flowers, and leaves, and brooks, And birds, will soon be ours.
A few soft, sunny days have shone, The air has lost its chill,
A bright-green tinge succeeds the brown, Upon the southern hill.
Off to the woods! a pleasant scene! Here sprouts the fresh young wintergreen, There swells a mossy mound; Though in the hollows drifts are piled, The wandering wind is sweet and mild, And buds are bursting round. Where its long rings uncurls the fern, The violet, nestling low, Casts back the white lid of its urn, Its purple streaks to show:
Beautiful blossom! first to rise
And smile beneath Spring's wakening skies; The courier of the band
Of coming flowers, what feelings sweet Gush, as the silvery gem we meet Upon its slender wand.
A sudden roar-a shade is cast- We look up with a start,
And, sounding like a transient blast, O'erhead the pigeons dart; Scarce their blue glancing shapes the eye Can trace, ere dotted on the sky,
They wheel in distant flight.
A chirp and swift the squirrel scours Along the prostrate trunk, and cowers Within its clefts from sight.
Amid the creeping pine, which spreads Its thick and verdant wreath, The scaurberry's downy spangle sheds Its rich, delicious breath. The bee-swarm murmurs by, and now It clusters black on yonder bough: The robin's mottled breast Glances that sunny spot across, As round it seeks the twig and moss To frame its summer nest. Warmer is each successive sky,
More soft the breezes pass, The maple's gems of crimson lie Upon the thick, green grass. The dogwood sheds its clusters white, The birch has dropp'd its tassels slight, Cowslips are by the rill;
The thresher whistles in the glen, Flutters around the warbling wren, And swamps have voices shrill.
A simultaneous burst of leaves
Has clothed the forest now, A single day's bright sunshine weaves This vivid, gorgeous show. Masses of shade are cast beneath, The flowers are spread in varied wreath, Night brings her soft, sweet moon; Morn wakes in mist, and twilight gray Weeps its bright dew, and smiling May Melts blooming into June!
THE LOST HUNTER. NUMB'D by the piercing, freezing air, And burden'd by his game, The hunter, struggling with despair, Dragg'd on his shivering frame; The rifle he had shoulder'd late Was trail'd along, a weary weight;
His pouch was void of food; The hours were speeding in their flight, And soon the long, keen, winter night
Would wrap the solitude.
Oft did he stoop a listening ear,
Sweep round an anxious eye,No bark or axe-blow could he hear, No human trace descry.
His sinuous path, by blazes, wound Among trunks group'd in myriads round; Through naked boughs, between Whose tangled architecture, fraught With many a shape grotesquely wrought, The hemlock's spire was seen.
An antler'd dweller of the wild
Had met his eager gaze,
And far his wandering steps beguiled
Within an unknown maze;
Stream, rock, and run-way he had cross'd, Unheeding, till the marks were lost
By which he used to roam;
And now, deep swamp and wild ravine And rugged mountain were between The hunter and his home.
A dusky haze, which slow had crept On high, now darken'd there, And a few snow-flakes fluttering swept Athwart the thick, gray air, Faster and faster, till between
The trunks and boughs, a mottled screen Of glimmering motes was spread, That tick'd against each object round With gentle and continuous sound, Like brook o'er pebbled bed.
The laurel tufts, that drooping hung Close roll'd around their stems,
And the sear beech-leaves still that clung, Were white with powdering gems. But, hark! afar a sullen moan Swell'd out to louder, deeper tone,
As surging near it pass'd,
And, bursting with a roar, and shock That made the groaning forest rock, On rush'd the winter blast.
As o'er it whistled, shriek'd, and hiss'd,
Caught by its swooping wings, The snow was whirl'd to eddying mist, Barb'd, as it seem'd, with stings; And now 'twas swept with lightning flight Above the loftiest hemlock's height,
Like drifting smoke, and now It hid the air with shooting clouds, And robed the trees with circling shrouds, Then dash'd in heaps below. Here, plunging in a billowy wreath, There, clinging to a limb, The suffering hunter gasp'd for breath, Brain reel'd, and eye grew dim; As though to whelm him in despair, Rapidly changed the blackening air To murkiest gloom of night, Till naught was seen around, below, But falling flakes and mantled snow, That gleam'd in ghastly white. At every blast an icy dart
Seem'd through his nerves to fly, The blood was freezing to his heart
Thought whisper'd he must die. The thundering tempest echo'd death, He felt it in his tighten'd breath; Spoil, rifle dropp'd, and slow
As the dread torpor crawling came Along his staggering, stiffening frame, He sunk upon the snow.
Reason forsook her shatter'd throne,- He deem'd that summer-hours Again around him brightly shone
In sunshine, leaves, and flowers; Again the fresh, green, forest-sod, Rifle in hand, he lightly trod,-
He heard the deer's low bleat; Or, couch'd within the shadowy nook, He drank the crystal of the brook That murmur'd at his feet.
It changed; his cabin roof o'erspread, Rafter, and wall, and chair, Gleam'd in the crackling fire, that shed
Its warmth, and he was there; His wife had clasp'd his hand, and now Her gentle kiss was on his brow,
His child was prattling by,
The hound crouch'd, dozing, near the blaze, And through the pane's frost-pictured haze He saw the white drifts fly.
That pass'd;-before his swimming sight Does not a figure bound,
And a soft voice, with wild delight, Proclaim the lost is found?
No, hunter, no! 'tis but the streak
Of whirling snow—the tempest's shriek— No human aid is near!
Never again that form will meet
Thy clasp'd embrace-those accents sweet Speak music to thine ear.
Morn broke;-away the clouds were chased, The sky was pure and bright, And on its blue the branches traced
Their webs of glittering white. Its ivory roof the hemlock stoop'd, The pine its silvery tassel droop'd,
Down bent the burden'd wood, And, scatter'd round, low points of green, Peering above the snowy scene,
Told where the thickets stood. In a deep hollow, drifted high,
A wave-like heap was thrown, Dazzlingly in the sunny sky
A diamond blaze it shone; The little snow-bird, chirping sweet, Dotted it o'er with tripping feet;
Unsullied, smooth, and fair,
It seem'd, like other mounds, where trunk And rock amid the wreaths were sunk, But, O! the dead was there.
Spring came with wakening breezes bland, Soft suns and melting rains, And, touch'd by her Ithuriel wand,
Earth bursts its winter-chains. In a deep nook, where moss and grass And fern-leaves wove a verdant mass, Some scatter'd bones beside, A mother, kneeling with her child, Told by her tears and wailings wild That there the lost had died.
MR. CUTTER published at Cincinnati, in 1848, a volume entitled Buena Vista, and other Poems," in the preface of which he says to the "gentle reader," "I desire that you will not for a moment suppose me insensible to their many and great imperfections, or deem me so vain as to expect that you will be startled by any sudden display of genius, or charmed by any imposing array of erudition. They were written, for the most part, amid the turmoil and excitement incident to the discharge of the duties of an arduous profession, in hours that were clouded by no ordinary toils,
with no other object or end in view but to lighten the burden of existence, to dissipate the gloom of the moment."
In the previous year, Mr. CUTTER had joined the army for the invasion of Mexico, as a captain of volunteers, and he participated in the victory of Buena Vista, and wrote upon the field his poem descriptive of that battle. The finest of his compositions is "The Song of Steam," which is worthy of the praise it has received, of being one of the best lyrics of the century. "The Song of Lightning," written more recently, is perhaps next to it in merit.
THE SONG OF STEAM.
HARNESS me down with your iron bands; Be sure of your curb and rein: For I scorn the power of your puny hands, As the tempest scorns a chain! How I laugh'd, as I lay conceal'd from sight, For many a countless hour, At the childish boast of human might, And the pride of human power! When I saw an army upon the land, A navy upon the seas, Creeping along, a snail-like band,
Or waiting the wayward breeze; When I mark'd the peasant fairly reel With the toil which he faintly bore, As he feebly turn'd the tardy wheel,
Or tugg'd at the weary oar:
When I measured the panting courser's speed, The flight of the courier-dove,
As they bore the law a king decreed, Or the lines of impatient love—
I could not but think how the world would feel, As these were outstripp'd afar,
When I should be bound to the rushing keel, Or chain'd to the flying car!
Ha, ha, ha! they found me at last;
They invited me forth at length,
And I rushed to my throne with a thunder-blast, And laugh'd in my iron strength! Oh! then ye saw a wondrous change On the earth and ocean wide, Where now my fiery armies range, Nor wait for wind and tide. Hurrah! hurrah! the water's o'er,
The mountains steep decline; Time-space--have yielded to my power; The world-the world is mine!
The rivers the sun hath earliest blest,
Or those where his beams decline; The giant streams of the queenly West, And the Orient floods divine.
The ocean pales where'er I sweep,
To hear my strength rejoice, And the monsters of the briny deep Cower, trembling at my voice.
I carry the wealth and the lord of earth, The thoughts of his godlike mind; The wind lags after my flying forth, The lightning is left behind.
In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine My tireless arm doth play,
Where the rocks never saw the sun's decline, Or the dawn of the glorious day.
I bring earth's glittering jewels up From the hidden cave below,
And I make the fountain's granite cup With a crystal gush o'erflow.
I blow the bellows, I forge the steel, In all the shops of trade;
I hammer the ore and turn the wheel Where my arms of strength are made.
I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint- I carry, I spin, I weave;
And all my doings I put into print
On every Saturday eve.
I've no muscles to weary, no breast to decay, No bones to be laid on the shelf," And soon I intend you may
go and play," While I manage this world myself. But harness me down with your iron bands; Be sure of your curb and rein:
For I scorn the strength of your puny hands, As the tempest scorns a chain !
AWAY, away through the sightless air- Stretch forth your iron thread; For I would not dim my sandals fair With the dust ye tamely tread; Ay, rear it up on its million piers—
Let it reach the world around,
And the journey ye make in a hundred years
I'll clear at a single bound!
Though I cannot toil like the groaning slave Ye have fetter'd with iron skill,
To ferry you over the boundless wave, Or grind in the noisy mill;
Let him sing his giant strength and speed: Why, a single shaft of mine Would give that monster a flight, indeed, To the depths of the ocean brine. No, no! I'm the spirit of light and love: To my unseen hand 't is given To pencil the ambient clouds above, And polish the stars of heaven.
I scatter the golden rays of fire
On the horizon far below,
And deck the skies where storms expire With my red and dazzling glow.
The deepest recesses of earth are mine- I traverse its silent core; Around me the starry diamonds shine, And the sparkling fields of ore; And oft I leap from my throne on high To the depths of the ocean's caves, Where the fadeless forests of coral lie, Far under the world of waves.
My being is like a lovely thought
That dwells in a sinless breast;
A tone of music that ne'er was caught- A word that was ne'er expressed.
I burn in the bright and burnish'd halls, Where the fountains of sunlight play- Where the curtain of gold and opal falls
O'er the scenes of the dying day. With a glance I cleave the sky in twain, I light it with a glare,
When fall the boding drops of rain
Through the darkly-curtain'd air; The rock-built towers, the turrets gray, The piles of a thousand years, Have not the strength of potters' clay Before my glittering spears.
From the Alps' or the highest Andes' crag, From the peaks of eternal snow, The dazzling folds of my fiery flag Gleam o'er the world below;
The earthquake heralds my coming power, The avalanche bounds away, And howling storms at midnight hour Proclaim my kingly sway.
Ye tremble when my legions come- When my quivering sword leaps out O'er the hills that echo my thunder-drum, And rend with my joyous shout:
Ye quail on the land or upon Ye stand in your fear aghast, To see me burn the stalwart trees, Or shiver the stately mast.
The hieroglyphs on the Persian wall, The letters of high command, Where the prophet read the tyrant's fall, Were traced with my burning hand; And oft in fire have I wrote since then, What angry Heaven decreed- But the sealed eyes of sinful men
Were all too blind to read.
At last the hour of light is here,
And kings no more shall blind, Nor the bigots crush with craven fear The forward march of mind;
The words of Truth, and Freedom's rays, Are from my pinions hurl'd,
And soon the sun of better days
Shall rise upon the world.
But away, away, through the sightless airStretch forth your iron thread;
For I would not soil my sandals fair
With the dust ye tamely tread.
Ay, rear it upon its million piers
Let it circle the world around, And the journey ye make in a hundred years I'll clear at a single bound!
ON THE DEATH OF GENERAL WORTH Now let the solemn minute gun
Arouse the morning ray.
And only with the setting sun
In echoes die away......
The muffled drum, the wailing fife,
Ah! let them murmur low,
O'er him who was their breath of life, The solemn notes of wo! ......
At Chippewa and Lundy's Lane, On Polaklaba's field,
Around him fell the crimson rain,
The battle-thunder peal'd; But proudly did the soldier gaze Upon his daring form,
When charging o'er the cannon's blaze Amid the sulphur storm.
Upon the heights of Monterey
Again his flag unroll'd,
And when the grape-shot rent away
Its latest starry fold,
His plumed cap above his head He waved upon the air, And cheer'd the gallant troops he led To glorious victory there.
But ah! the dreadful seal is broke- In darkness walks abroad The pestilence, whose silent stroke Is like the doom of Gon! And the hero by its fell decree In death is sleeping now, With the laurel wreath of victory Still green upon his brow!
« ZurückWeiter » |