INVOCATION.

Thou with the dark blue eye upturned to heaven, And cheek now pale, now warm with radiant glow, Daughter of God,— most dear,— Come with thy quivering tear,

And tresses wild, and robes of loosened flow,— To thy lone votaress let one look be given! Come Poesy! nor like some just-formed maid, With heart as yet unswoln by bliss or woe;—

But of such age be seen As Egypt's glowing queen, When her brave Roman learned to love her so That death and loss of fame, were, by a smile, repaid.

Or as thy Sappho, when too fierce assailed By stern ingratitude her tender breast:— Her love by scorn repaid Her friendship true betrayed,

Sick of the guileful earth, she sank for rest In the cold waves embrace; while Grecian muse bewailed. Be to my mortal eye, like some fair dame — Ripe, but untouched by time; whose frequent blush

Plays o'er her cheek of truth As soft as earliest youth; While thoughts exalted to her mild eye rush — And the expanded soul, tells‘ twas from heaven it came.

Daughter of life's first cause; who, when he saw The ills that unborn innocents must bear, When doomed to come to earth — Bethought — and gave thee birth

To charm the poison from affliction there; And from his source eternal, bade thee draw. He gave thee power, inferior to his own But in control o'er matter.‘ Mid the crash

Of earthquake, war, and storm, Is seen thy radiant form Thou com'st at midnight on the lightning's flash, And ope'st to those thou lov'st new scenes and worlds unknown.

And still, as wild barbarians fiercely break The graceful column and the marble dome — Where arts too long have lain Debased at pleasure's fain,

And bleeding justice called on wrath to come, ‘ Mid ruins heaped around, thou bidst thy votarists wake. Methinks I see thee on the broken shrine Of some fall'n temple — where the grass waves high

With many a flowret wild; While some lone, pensive, child Looks on the sculpture with a wondering eye Whose kindling fires betray that he is chosen thine.

Or on some beetling cliff — where the mad waves Rush echoing thro’ the high-arched caves below, I view some love-reft fair Whose sighing warms the air,

Gaze anxious on the ocean as it raves And call on thee-alone, of power to sooth her woe. Friend of the wretched; smoother of the couch Of pining hope; thy pitying form I know!

Where thro’ the wakeful night, By a dim taper's light, Lies a pale youth, upon his pallet low, Whose wan and woe-worn charms rekindle at thy touch.

Friendless — oppressed by fate — the restless fires Of his thralled soul prey on his beauteous frame — Till, strengthened by thine aid, He shapes some kindred maid,

Pours forth in song the life consuming flame, And for awhile forgets his sufferings and desires. Scorner of thoughtless grandeur, thou hast chose Thy best-beloved from ruddy Nature's breast:

The grotto dark and rude — The forest solitude — The craggy mount by blushing clouds carest — Have altars where thy light etherial glows.

“Many are poets who have never penned Their inspirations, and, perchance, the best; They felt, they loved, and died; but would not lend Their thoughts to meaner beings; they comprest

The god within them, and rejoined the stars Unlaurel'd upon earth.” Thy sovereign priest by earth's vile sons was driven To make the cold unconscious earth his bed:

The damp cave mocked his sighs — But from his sightless eyes, Wrung forth by wrongs, the anguished drops he shed, Fell each as an appeal to summon thee from heaven.

Thou sought'st him in his desolation; placed On thy warm bosom his unpillowed head; Bade him for visions live More bright than worlds can give;

O'er his pale lips thy soul infusive shed That left his dust adored where kings decay untraced. Source of deep feeling — of surpassing love — Creative power,—‘ tis thou hast peopled heaven

Since man from dust arose His birth the cherub owes To thee — by thee his rapturous harp was given And white wings tipp'd with gold that cool the domes above.

Husher of secret sighs — from childhood's hour The slave of Fate, I've knelt before thy throne; To thy loved courts have sped Whene'er my heart has bled,

And every ray of bliss that heart has known Has reached it thro’ thy grief-dispelling power. Fain thro’ my native solitudes I'd roam Bathe my rude harp in my bright native streams

Twine it with flowers that bloom But for the deserts gloom, Or, for the long and jetty hair that gleams O'er the dark-bosomed maid that makes the wild her home.

I sing not for the crowd, or low or high — A pensive wanderer on life's thorny heath Earth's pageants for my view Have nought: I love but few,

And few who chance to hear thy trembling breath, My lyre, for her who wakes thee, have a sigh. Forsake me not! none ever loved thee more! Fair queen, I'll meet woe's fearfulest frown — and smile;

If mid the scene severe Thou'lt drop on me one tear, And let thy flitting form sometimes beguile The present of its ills — I'll scorn them and adore.

Then warm the form relentless fate would chill — Dark lours my night — Oh! give me one embrace! If every pain I bear Befit me for thy care,

Come sorrow — scorn — desertion — I can chase Despair, fell watching for her victim still.