APOSTROPHE TO JOHANN SEBAS TIAN BACH (Prestissimo) Some who hear are rapt away Borne beyond the evening star To the pearly gates Where the Flame-guard waits Oh, the soul's attuned ear Set to harps of gold Struck by rapt adoring Angel hosts white-stoled, Harmonies divine Of the far-revolving spheres, Love's eternal hymn of joys and tears. Master Bach, this was thy power! Like radiant many-prismed blossoms Oh, miracle repeated A thousand times in thy dear life; When men defeated, Undone by strife, New courage gained, New hopes conceived; Once more believed Exile with broken wings, Mourning her Eden vanisht Once more to Hope's hand clings! And sees a beauteous vision Of joy elysian, Crowned with immortal rays, Of paradisal days! Nathan Haskell Dole. CHOPIN'S NOCTURNE IN G MINOR Faint through the twilight hazes Only the brook's murmur golden The soul holds breath to hear. Voices of joy and sorrow Vanished and far away As the dawn of the sun-bathed morrow When faint through the twilight hazes And faint through the woodland mazes Arlo Bates. SCHUBERT Who would know thee, a loving heart must bring, And hear with his heart's ears; else shall he miss Thy perfect message and his own true bliss, For deepest depths of human tenderness Are thine, the mother's love and dear caress, The wanderer's longing for the blessed sight Of home and Fatherland, the lover's heart, Wild with despair, or thrilled with joyance sweet Of happy souls who full requital meet. Thus nature's yearnings find in thee a part; O gentlest Master of them all, — since pain And joy do live, thou hast not lived in vain! Zitella Cocke. BEETHOVEN Music as of the winds when they awake, Wailing, in the mid-forest; music that raves Like moonless tides about forlorn sea-caves On desolate shores, where swell weird songs. and break In peals of demon laughter; chords athirst Down-sinking in voluptuous luxury; Rich harmonies, full-pulsed with deep delight, And melodies dying deliciously As odorous sighs breathed through the quiet night By violets. Thus Beethoven speaks for me. John Todhunter. BACH, IN THE FUGUES AND Contentedly with strictest strands confined, Sports in the sun that oceanic mind: To leap their bourn these waves did never long, Or roll against the stars their rock-bound song. William Watson. |