Page:The Poets and Poetry of the West.djvu/528

512 That the care of the storm-controlling power

May be over the post-boy's way?

The wayward wanderer from his home,

The sailor upon the sea,

Have prayers to bless them where they roam—

Who thinketh to pray for me?

But the scene is changed! up rides the moon

Like a ship upon the sea;

Now on my steeds! this glorious noon

Of a night so dark shall be

A scene for us; toss high your heads

And cheerily speed away;

We shall startle the sleepers in their beds

Before the dawn of day.

Like a shuttle thrown by the hand of fate

Forward and back I go:

Bearing a thread to the desolate

To darken their web of woe:

And a brighter thread to the glad of heart,

And a mingled one for all;

But the dark and the light I cannot part,

Nor alter their hues at all.

SONG OF THE AGE.

RESOLUTION.

, room for the freed spirit! Let it fling

Its pinions worn with bondage once more wide,

And if in earth or air there is a thing

To stay its soaring, let the heavens chide!

Away, the silken bondage of young dreams;

No more in gentle dalliance I'll lay

My hand upon my lute, like one who seems

In half unconscious idleness to play.

But all there is in me of living soul,

Of high, proud daring, or of untried trust,