Part 11 (1/2)

At last the spirit took their souls away, And in their cottage lay their lifeless clay; Their bodies changed--and insects they became-- Green as the gra.s.s--but still their cry the same.

Hence in all trees, we hear in starry night, The contradiction, and the wordy fight.

We hear John Jones, and his unhappy wife, And all their brood forever in a strife: And Katy did, and Katy didn't still Are sounds incessant as a murmuring rill.

V.

_THE IMAGE-MAKER._

DWELLER ON EARTH.

Thou dwellest here, beneath this dome, A Pilgrim, far from thine own home.

Where is thine heart, and where thy land?

Thou longest for some distant strand.

We have thy love and gentle care, Thou bearest blessings every where.

Yet day and night, and light and shade Shall with less labor one be made,

Than thou in sympathy be one With us, who through our course will run, Laden with cares, with pleasures worn, Children of hope to sorrow born.

Thou hast our speech, our garb, our toil, Well known, yet stranger on our soil.

Some deeper hidden life is thine, As if we saw the tortuous vine

'Mid veiling branches intertwine; Swinging in air its precious fruit, While the deep mould has hid its root; From view its highest honors lost,

'Mid the oak leaves in murmurs tost, A secret work thy endless task, Thy endless care, of that we ask.

PILGRIM.

I seek to form an Image here.

DWELLER ON EARTH.

Thou art a Sculptor! Yet our ear Doth catch no sound of chisel stroke, No hammer clang--no marble broke.

PILGRIM.

The silence of Eternity Around my work doth ever lie.

When marbles into dust shall fall, And human art no fame befall,

The sun no more its beams shall give To statues seeming half to live, Beauty no more on genius wait, Which copying seemeth to create;

When heaven and earth shall pa.s.s away, When breaketh everlasting day, Then shall the Image that I form, Appear 'mid nature's dying storm.

The Image that no human skill Could fas.h.i.+on, or Archangel's will; No angel mind the model give Of that which shall forever live.