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SELECTIONS FROM POEMS BY ELLIS BELL.THE NIGHT-WIND.
Here again is the same mind in converse with a like abstraction. "The Night-Wind," breathing through an open window, has visited an ear which discerned language in its whispers.
In summer`s mellow midnight,
A cloudless moon shone through
Our open parlour window,
And rose-trees wet with dew.
I sat in silent musing;
The soft wind waved my hair;
It told me heaven was glorious,
And sleeping earth was fair.
I needed not its breathing
To bring such thoughts to me;
But still it whispered lowly,
How dark the woods will be!
"The thick leaves in my murmur
Are rustling like a dream,
And all their myriad voices
Instinct with spirit seem."
I said, "Go, gentle singer,
Thy wooing voice is kind:
But do not think its music
Has power to reach my mind.
"Play with the scented flower,
The young tree`s supple bough,
And leave my human feelings
In their own course to flow."
The wanderer would not heed me;
Its kiss grew warmer still.
"O come!" it sighed so sweetly;
"I`ll win thee `gainst thy will.
"Were we not friends from childhood?
Have I not loved thee long?
As long as thou, the solemn night,
Whose silence wakes my song.
"And when thy heart is resting
Beneath the church-aisle stone,
I shall have time for mourning,
And THOU for being alone."
In these stanzas a louder gale has roused the sleeper on her pillow: the wakened soul struggles to blend with the storm by which it is swayed:--
Ay--there it is! it wakes to-night
Deep feelings I thought dead;
Strong in the blast--quick gathering light--
The heart`s flame kindles red.
"Now I can tell by thine altered cheek,
And by thine eyes` full gaze,
And by the words thou scarce dost speak,
How wildly fancy plays.
"Yes--I could swear that glorious wind
Has swept the world aside,
Has dashed its memory from thy mind
Like foam-bells from the tide:
"And thou art now a spirit pouring
Thy presence into all:
The thunder of the tempest`s roaring,
The whisper of its fall:
"An universal influence,
From thine own influence free;
A principle of life--intense--
Lost to mortality.
"Thus truly, when that breast is cold,
Thy prisoned soul shall rise;
The dungeon mingle with the mould--
The captive with the skies.
Nature`s deep being, thine shall hold,
Her spirit all thy spirit fold,
Her breath absorb thy sighs.
Mortal! though soon life`s tale is told;
Who once lives, never dies!"
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