THE FLOWER OF THE RUINS

Take thy lute and sing

By the ruined castle walls,

Where the torrent-foam falls,

And long weeds wave:

Take thy lute and sing,

O'er the grey ancestral grave!

Daughter of a King,

Tune thy string.

Sing of happy hours,

In the roar of rushing time;

Till all the echoes chime

To the days gone by;

Sing of passing hours

To the ever-present sky; -

Weep — and let the showers

Wake thy flowers.

Sing of glories gone: -

No more the blazoned fold

From the banner is unrolled;

The gold sun is set.

Sing his glory gone,

For thy voice may charm him yet;

Daughter of the dawn,

He is gone!

Pour forth all thy grief!

Passionately sweep the chords,

Wed them quivering to thy words;

Wild words of wail!

Shed thy withered grief -

But hold not Autumn to thy bale;

The eddy of the leaf

Must be brief!

Sing up to the night:

Hard it is for streaming tears

To read the calmness of the spheres;

Coldly they shine;

Sing up to their light;

They have views thou may'st divine -

Gain prophetic sight

From their light!

On the windy hills

Lo, the little harebell leans

On the spire-grass that it queens,

With bonnet blue;

Trusting love instils

Love and subject reverence true;

Learn what love instils

On the hills!

By the bare wayside

Placid snowdrops hang their cheeks,

Softly touch'd with pale green streaks,

Soon, soon, to die;

On the clothed hedgeside

Bands of rosy beauties vie,

In their prophesied

Summer pride.

From the snowdrop learn;

Not in her pale life lives she,

But in her blushing prophecy.

Thus be thy hopes,

Living but to yearn

Upwards to the hidden scopes; -

Even within the urn

Let them burn!

Heroes of thy race -

Warriors with golden crowns,

Ghostly shapes with marbled frowns

Stare thee to stone;

Matrons of thy race

Pass before thee making moan;

Full of solemn grace

Is their pace.

Piteous their despair!

Piteous their looks forlorn!

Terrible their ghostly scorn!

Still hold thou fast; -

Heed not their despair! -

Thou art thy future, not thy past;

Let them glance and glare

Thro’ the air.

Thou the ruin's bud,

Be not that moist rich-smelling weed

With its arras-sembled brede,

And ruin-haunting stalk;

Thou the ruin's bud,

Be still the rose that lights the walk,

Mix thy fragrant blood

With the flood!