Life and Existence

’Tis solitude should teach us how to die; It hath no flatterers; vanity can give No hollow aid; alone—man with his God must strive.

Among them, but not of them; in a shroud Of thoughts which were not their thoughts.

Fame is the thirst of youth.

Did ye not hear it?—No! ’twas but the wind, Or the car rattling o’er the stony street. On with the dance! let joy be unconfined; No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet To chase the glowing hours with flying feet.

Fire from the mind as vigor from the limb; And life’s enchanted cup but sparkles near the brim.

What is the worst of woes that wait on age? What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow? To view each loved one blotted from life’s page, And be alone on earth, as I am now.

A schoolboy’s tale, the wonder of an hour!

Gone—glimmering through the dream of things that were.

For years fleet away with the wings of the dove.

Some banquet hall deserted, And all but he departed.

Oft in the stilly night, Ere Slumber’s chain has bound me, Fond Memory brings the light Of other days around me; The words of love then spoken; The cheerful hearts now broken.

Oh, breathe not his name! let it sleep in the shade, Where cold and unhonor’d his relics are laid.

And the tear that we shed, though in secret it rolls, Shall long keep his memory green in our souls.

And the tear that we shed, though in secret it rolls, Shall long keep his memory green in our souls.

I have had playmates, I have had companions, In my days of childhood, in my joyful school days— All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have had playmates, I have had companions, In my days of childhood, in my joyful school days— All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

A poet lies, or that which once seemed he— Oh, lift a thought in prayer for S.T.C.! That he, who many a year, with toil of breath, Found death in life, may here find life in death.

Joy is the sweet voice, joy the luminous cloud— We in ourselves rejoice! And thence flows all that charms or ear or sight, All melodies the echoes of that voice, All colors a suffusion from that light.

O lady! we receive but what we give And in our life alone does Nature live.

On that green light that lingers in the west: I may not hope from outward forms to win The passion and the life, whose fountains are within.

I see, not feel, how beautiful they are!

Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God.

That saints will aid if men will call: For the blue sky bends over all!

Her gentle limbs did she undress, And lay down in her loveliness.