When faint and sad o'er sorrow's desert wild Slow journeys onward poor misfortune's child; When fades each lovely form by fancy drest, And inly pines the self-consuming breast; (No scourge of scorpions in thy right arm dread. No helmed terrors nodding o'er thy head); Assume, O death! the cherub wings of peace, And bid the heart-sick wanderer's anguish cease!
Thee, Chatterton! yon unblest stones protect From want, and the bleak freezings of neglect! Escaped the sore wounds of affliction's rod, Meek at the throne of mercy, and of God, Perchance, thou raisest high th' enraptured hymn Amid the blaze of seraphin!
Yet oft ('tis nature's call) I weep, that heaven-born genius so should fall; And oft, in fancy's saddest hour, my soul Averted shudders at the poisoned bowl. Now groans my sickening heart, as still I view Thy corse of livid hue; And now a flash of indignation high Darts thro' the tear, that glistens in mine eye!
Is this the land of song-ennobled line? Is this the land, where genius ne'er in vain Pour'd forth his lofty strain? Ah me! yet Spenser, gentlest bard divine, Beneath chill disappointment's shade, His weary limbs in lonely anguish laid, And o'er her darling dead Pity hopeless hung her head, While 'mid the pelting of that merciless storm, Sunk to the cold earth Otway's famished form?
Sublime of thought, and confident of fame From vales where Avon winds the minstrel came Lighted-hearted youth! he hastes along And meditates the future song. How dauntless AElla fray'd the Dacian foes: See, as floating high in air Glitter teh sunny visions fair, His eyes dance rapture, and his bosom glows?
Ah! where are fled the charms of vernal grace, And joy's wild gleams, light-flashing o'er thy face? Youth of tumultuous soul, and haggard eye! Thy wasted form, thy hurried steps I view, On thy cold forehead starts the anguished dew: And dreadful was that bosom-rending sigh!
Such were the struggles of that gloomy hour, When care, of withered brow, Prepared the poison's power: Already to thy lips was raised the bowl. When near thee stood affection meek (Her bosom bare, and wildly pale her cheek) Thy sullen gaze she bade thee roll On scenes that well might melt thy soul; Thy native cot she flashed upon thy view, Thy native cot, where still, at close of day, Peace smiling sate, and listened to thy lay; Thy sister's shrieks she bade thee hear, And mark thy mother's tear; See, see her breast's convulsive throe, Her silent agony of woe! Ah! dash the poisoned chalice from thy hand!
And thou hadst dashed it, at her soft command, But that despair and indignation rose, And told again the story of thy woes; Told the keen insult of th' unfeeling heart; The dread dependence on the low-born mind; Told ev'ry pang, with which thy soul must smart, Neglect, and grinning scorn, and want combined! Recoiling quick, thou bad'st the friend of pain Roll the black tide of death thro' every freezing vein!
Ye woods! that wave o'er Avon's rocky steep, To fancy's ear sweet is your murm'ring deep! For here she loves the cypress wreath to weave; Watching, with wistful eye, the sadd'ning tints of eve. Here, far from men, amid this pathless grove, In solemn thought the minstrel wont to rove, Like star-beam on the slow sequestered tide Lone-glittering, thro' the high tree branching wide. And here, in inspiration's eager hour, When most the big soul feels the madd'ning power, These wilds, these caverns roaming o'er, Round which the screaming sea-gulls soar, With wild unequal steps he passed along, Oft pouring on the winds a broken song: Anon, upon some rough rock's fearful brow Would pause abrupt -- and gaze upon the waves below.
Poor Chatterton! he sorrows for thy fate Who would have praised and loved thee, ere too late. Poor Chatterton! farewell! of darkest hues This chaplet cast I on thy shapeless tomb; But dare no longer on the sad theme muse, Lest kindred woes persuade a kindred doom! Hence, gloomy thoughts! no more my soul shall dwell On joys that were! No more endure to weigh The shame and anguish of the evil day, Wisely forgetful! O'er the ocean swell Sublime of hope I seek the cottaged dell Where virtue calm with careless step may stray; And, dancing to the moonlight roundelay, The wizard passions weave an holy spell!
O Chatterton! that thou wert yet alive! Sure thou would'st spread the canvas to the gale, And love, with us, the tinkling team to drive O'er peaceful freedom's undivided dale; And we, at sober eve, would round thee throng, Hanging, enraptured, on thy stately song! And greet with smiles the young-eyed poesy All deftly mask'd, as hoar antiquity.
Alas, vain phantasies! the fleeting brood Of woe self-solaced in her dreamy mood! Yet will I love to follow the sweet dream, Where Susquehannah pours his untamed stream; And on some hill, whose forest-frowning side Waves o'er the murmurs of his calmer tide, Will raise a solemn cenotaph to thee, Sweet harper of time-shrouded minstrelsy! And there, soothed sadly by the dirgeful wind, Muse on the sore ills I had left behind.
Ode To Georgiana, Duchess Of Devonshire, On The Twenty-Fourth Stanza In Her 'Passage Over Mount Gothard.'
'And hail the chapel! hail the platform wild Where Tell directed the avenging dart, With well-strung arm, that first preserved his child, Then aimed the arrow at the tyrant's heart.'
Splendor's fondly fostered child! And did you hail the platform wild, Where once the Austrian fell Beneath the shaft of Tell! O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure! Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?
Light as a dream your days their circlets ran. From all that teaches brotherhood to Man Far, far removed! from want, from hope, from fear! Enchanting music lulled your infant ear, Obeisance, praises sotohed your infant heart: Emblazonments and old ancestral crests, With many a bright obtrusive form of art, Detained your eye from nature: stately vests, That veiling strove to deck your charms divine, Rich viands and the pleasurable wine, Were yours unearned by toil; nor could you see The unenjoying toiler's misery. And yet, free Nature's uncorrupted child, You hailed the chapel and the platform wild, Where once the Austrian fell Beneath the shaft of Tell! O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure! Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?
There crowd your finely-fibred frame, All living faculties of bliss; And Genius to your cradle came, His forehead wreathed with lambent flame, And bending low, with godlike kiss Breathed in a more celestial life; But boasts not many a fair compeer, A heart as sensitive to joy and fear And some, perchance, might wage an equal strife. Some few, to nobler being wrought, Corrivals in the nobler gift of thought. Yet these delight to celebrate Laurelled war and plumy state; Or in verse and music dress Tales of rustic happiness -- Pernicious tales! insidious strains! That steel the rich man's breast, And mock the lot unblest, The sordid vices and the abject pains, Which evermore must be The doom of ignorance and penury! But you, free Nature's uncorrupted child, You hailed the chapel and the platform wild, Where once the Austrian fell Beneath the shaft of Tell! O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure! Whence learn'd you that heroic measure?
You were a mother! That most holy name, Which Heaven and Nature bless, I may not vilely prostitute to those Whose infants owe them less Than the poor caterpiller owes Its gaudy parent fly. You were a mother! at your bosom fed The babes that loved you. You, with laughing eye, Each twilight-thought, each nascent feeling read, Which you yourself created. Oh! delight! A secondt ime to be a mother, Without the mother's bitter groans: Another thought, and yet another, By touch, or taste, by looks or tones O'er the growing sense to roll, The mother of your infant's soul! The Angel of the Earth, who, while he guides His chariot-planet round the goal of day, All trembling gazes on the eye of God, A moment turned his awful face away; And as he viewed you, from his aspect sweet New influences in your being rose, Blest intuitions and communions fleet With living Nature, in her joys and woes Thenceforth your soul rejoiced to see The shrine of social Liberty! O beautiful! O Nature's child! 'Twas thence you hailed the platform wild Where once the Austrian fell Beneath the shaft of Tell! O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure! Thence learn'd you that heroic measure.
