love poem

With open eyes that look on God,
My daily journey I pursue:
I do not dread His lifted rod;
Why should I fear what Love can do?
And, if I need that He chastise,
Is He not good as He is wise?

I know if I but follow Him
I shall be safe from harm and make —
Albeit all the way be dim —
Nor slip nor failure nor mistake;
Or, making such, He will ordain
What seems my loss shall prove my gain.

And, though I look, to careless eyes,
A waif on pathless waters cast,
His faithful promise shall suffice

When I have been long gone, if one I love,
And who loves me, shall chance upon a ring,
That I have worn, or any simple thing, —
A knot of ribbon, or a faded glove, —
I wonder if the sight of it will move
To fond remembrance, and if tears will spring,
And if the sudden memory will bring
A sudden sadness over field and grove.
Perhaps: and yet how quickly we forget!
And how new scenes, new faces that we meet,
Crowd out the old, — until the world grows gay
Above forgotten graves. Softest regret

UPON HER ATTEMPT TO SKETCH THE LIKENESS OF A DECEASED
FRIEND .

I FEAR in vain you hope to trace
The features of her lovely face.
Bright, blessed vision! it is gone,
And left us in this world alone.

But should fond memory be true,
And every line present to view,
Yet would it want the heavenly soul
Which graced and harmonized the whole.

So when the rose has lived its day,
And with the night wind dies away,
And sheds its sweetly perfumed leaves,

AT SIXTY YEARS OF AGE .

A T love my Helen 's an adept,
Yet calls my age a secret kept;
She tells me, with her speaking eyes,
That Love can still ensnare his prize;
Her lips, though mute, the tale repeat,
That Love 's the master of the seat;
The wrinkles fly at Helen's view,
Her folding arms the boy renew, —
With her alone my heart can prove
That mine 's at least the age for love.

Love is a halt across the desert sand —
One night of stars to drink,
Of dear earned rest
Beneath the tropic heaven of your breast.

Then on — unswerved by weariness
Of our slow moving caravan of sense,
To further parched adventuring unguessed

Open the tent! 'Tis dawn!
I hear, I understand —
God sounds the clarion.

I LOVE to see the blushing cheek
Of gay and joyous youth;
Its raptures, all too full to speak;
Its innocence and truth.

I grieve to think a blight may fall
Upon the lovely flower;
Its dewy perfumed leaves may all
Be scattered in an hour.

My heart, unbidden, heaves a sigh,
And breathes a silent prayer —
That storms may gently pass it by,
And time its glory spare.

O quench the sun,
Blur every star,
And bid the moon begone!
Love will the surer blindfold grope
To heavens of his own.

He lights the soul
With myriads
Of pagan fires to bliss —
Grant Love his hour of blazing darks,
His heavens glory-hid!

O quench the sun,
Blur every star,
And bid the moon begone!
Let Love with hot immortal lips
Find heavens of his own!

I.

Thou lovely source of true delight,
Whom I unseen adore,
Unveil thy beauties to my sight,
That I may love thee more.

II.

Thy glory o'er creation shines;
But in thy sacred word
I read, in fairer, brighter lines,
My bleeding, dying Lord.

III.

'Tis here, whene'er my comforts droop,
And sins and sorrows rise,
Thy love, with cheerful beams of hope,

Of the water fall 'tis born,
In the nodding fields of corn,
Blest type of Masons' love and plenty;
And the hymn of our delight
Shall be this symbol bright,
Singing the type of love and plenty. Chorus . —

The emblem of plenty,
The rich, GOLDEN EAR ,
Gift of a Father of grace ever dear, —
Oh, the hymn of our delight,

TO ANNA-LOUISA, ON HER ODE TO FANCY .

Say , child of Phaebus and the eldest Grace,
Whose lyre melodious, and enchanting face,
The blendid title of thy birth proclaim;
Say, lovely Naiad of Castalia's streams,
Why thus thy Muse on Fiction's pillow dreams,
And fondly woos the rainbow-mantled Dame?
When stern Misfortune, with her Gorgon frown,
Congeals the fairy face of Bliss to stone,
Hope to the horns of Fancy's altar flies;