Poems

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Page 501 - Place me on Sunium's marbled steep, Where nothing, save the waves and I, May hear our mutual murmurs sweep; There, swan-like, let me sing and die: A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine— Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!
Page 500 - What, silent still ? and silent all ? Ah ! no ;— the voices of the dead Sound like a distant torrent's fall, And answer, ' Let one living head, But one, arise, — we come, we come ! ' Tis but the living who are dumb.
Page 500 - Must we but blush? — Our fathers bled. Earth! render back from out thy breast A remnant of our Spartan dead ! Of the three hundred grant but three, To make a new Thermopylae!
Page 499 - Persians' grave, I could not deem myself a slave. A king sate on the rocky brow Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; And ships, by thousands, lay below, And men in nations; - all were his! He counted them at break of day And when the sun set where were they?
Page 351 - Deserved to be dearest of all : In the desert a fountain is springing, In the wide waste there still is a tree, And a bird in the solitude singing, Which speaks to my spirit of thee.
Page 512 - Ave Maria ! blessed be the hour ! The time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft Have felt that moment in its fullest power Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft, While swung the deep bell in the distant tower. Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft, And not a breath crept through the rosy air, And yet the forest leaves seem'd stirr'd with prayer.
Page 318 - THERE'S not a joy the world can give like that it takes away When the glow of early thought declines In feeling's dull decay; 'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, which fades so fast, But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth itself be past.
Page 360 - And they were enemies: they met beside The dying embers of an altar-place Where had been heap'da mass of holy things For an unholy usage; they raked up, And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton hands The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath Blew for a little life, and made a flame Which was a mockery; then they lifted up Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld Each other's aspects — saw, and shriek'd, and died — Even of their mutual hideousness they died, Unknowing who he was upon whose...
Page 339 - To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, Their country conquers with their martyrdom, And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. Chillon! thy prison is a holy place, And thy sad floor an altar — for 'twas trod, Until his very steps have left a trace Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, By Bonnivard ! — May none those marks efface ! For they appeal from tyranny to God.
Page 333 - Yet, oh yet, thyself deceive not; Love may sink by slow decay, But by sudden wrench, believe not Hearts can thus be torn away...

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