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THE DESERTED HOUSE.

LIFE and Thought have gone away
Side by side,

Leaving door and windows wide :
Careless tenants they !

All within is dark as night :
In the windows is no light;

And no murmur at the door,
So frequent on its hinge before.

Close the door, the shutters close,

Or through the windows we shall see

The nakedness and vacancy

Of the dark deserted house.

Come

away: no more of mirth

Is here or merry-making sound.

The house was builded of the earth,

And shall fall again to ground.

Come away for Life and Thought
Here no longer dwell;

But in a city glorious—

A great and distant city-have bought
A mansion incorruptible.

Would they could have stayed with us!

THE DYING SWAN.

THE plain was grassy, wild and bare,
Wide, wild, and open to the air,
Which had built up everywhere

An under-roof of doleful gray.
With an inner voice the river ran,
Adown it floated a dying swan,
And loudly did lament.

It was the middle of the day. Ever the weary wind went on,

And took the reed-tops as it went.

Some blue peaks in the distance rose,
And white against the cold-white sky,
Shone out their crowning snows.

One willow over the river wept,

And shook the wave as the wind did sigh; Above in the wind was the swallow,

Chasing itself at its own wild will,

And far thro' the marish green and still

The tangled water-courses slept,

Shot over with purple, and green, and yellow.

The wild swan's death-hymn took the soul
Of that waste place with joy

Hidden in sorrow at first to the ear

The warble was low, and full and clear;
And floating about the under-sky,
Prevailing in weakness, the coronach stole
Sometimes afar, and sometimes anear;
But anon her awful jubilant voice,
With a music strange and manifold,

Flow'd forth on a carol free and bold:

As when a mighty people rejoice

With shawms, and with cymbals, and harps of gold, And the tumult of their acclaim is roll'd

Through the open gates of the city afar,

To the shepherd who watcheth the evening star.
And the creeping mosses and clambering weeds,
And the willow-branches hoar and dank,

And the wavy swell of the soughing reeds,
And the wave-worn horns of the echoing bank,
And the silvery marish-flowers that throng
The desolate creeks and pools among,

Were flooded over with eddying song.

A DIRGE.

I.

Now is done thy long day's work;
Fold thy palms across thy breast,
Fold thine arms, turn to thy rest.
Let them rave.

Shadows of the silver birk

Sweep the green that folds thy grave. Let them rave.

II.

Thee nor carketh care nor slander;

Nothing but the small cold worm
Fretteth thine enshrouded form.

Let them rave.

Light and shadow ever wander

O'er the green that folds thy grave.
Let them rave.

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