Poems of Mdcccxxxiii

Mine be the strength of spirit, full and free,Like some broad river rushing down alone,With the selfsame impulse wherewith he was thrownFrom his loud fount upon the echoing lea:—Which with increasing might doth forward fleeBy town, and tower, and hill, and cape, and isle,And in the middle of the green salt seaKeeps his blue waters fresh for many a mile.Mine be the Power which ever to its swayWill win the wise at once, and by degreesMay into uncongenial spirits flow;Even as the great gulfstream of FloridaFloats far away into the Northern SeasThe lavish growths of Southern Mexico.

My life is full of weary days,But good things have not kept aloof,Nor wander’d into other ways:I have not lack’d thy mild reproof,Nor golden largess of thy praise.

The second began “And now shake hands”. In the fourth stanza for“sudden laughters” of the jay was substituted the felicitous “suddenscritches,” and the sixth and seventh stanzas were suppressed.

All good things have not kept aloofNor wandered into other ways:I have not lacked thy mild reproof,Nor golden largess of thy praise.But life is full of weary days.

Shake hands, my friend, across the brinkOf that deep grave to which I go:Shake hands once more: I cannot sinkSo far—far down, but I shall knowThy voice, and answer from below.

When in the darkness over meThe fourhanded mole shall scrape,Plant thou no dusky cypresstree,Nor wreathe thy cap with doleful crape,But pledge me in the flowing grape.

And when the sappy field and woodGrow green beneath the showery gray,And rugged barks begin to bud,And through damp holts newflushed with May,Ring sudden laughters of the Jay,

Then let wise Nature work her will,And on my clay her darnels grow;Come only, when the days are still,And at my headstone whisper low,And tell me if the woodbines blow.

If thou art blest, my mother’s smileUndimmed, if bees are on the wing:Then cease, my friend, a little while,That I may hear the throstle singHis bridal song, the boast of spring.

Sweet as the noise in parchèd plainsOf bubbling wells that fret the stones,(If any sense in me remains)Thy words will be: thy cheerful tonesAs welcome to my crumbling bones.