Works

The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned
To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,
And spread the roof above them, ere he framed
The lofty vault, to gather and roll back...

The summer day is closed, the sun is set:
Well they have done their office, those bright hours,
The latest of whose train goes softly out
In the red West. The green blade of the ground...

It is the spot I came to seek,
My fathers' ancient burial-place
Ere from these vales, ashamed and weak,
Withdrew our wasted race.
It is the spot, I know it well,
Of which our old traditions tell.
...

There sits a lovely maiden,
The ocean murmuring nigh;
She throws the hook, and watches;
The fishes pass it by.

A ring, with a red jewel,
Is sparkling on her hand;
Upon the hook she binds it,...

Midst greens and shades the Catterskill leaps,
From cliffs where the wood-flower clings;
All summer he moistens his verdant steeps
With the sweet light spray of the mountain springs;...

Diamante falso y fingido, - Engastado en pedernal, &c.


"False diamond set in flint! the caverns of the mine
Are warmer than the breast that holds that faithless heart of thine;...

It is a fearful night; a feeble glare
Streams from the sick moon in the o'erclouded sky;
The ridgy billows, with a mighty cry,
Rush on the foamy beaches wild and bare;...

Stay, rivulet, nor haste to leave
The lovely vale that lies around thee.
Why wouldst thou be a sea at eve,
When but a fount the morning found thee?

Born when the skies began to glow,...

'Tis sweet, in the green Spring,
To gaze upon the wakening fields around;
Birds in the thicket sing,
Winds whisper, waters prattle from the ground;
A thousand odours rise,...

I cannot forget with what fervid devotion
I worshipped the vision of verse and of fame.
Each gaze at the glories of earth, sky, and ocean,
To my kindled emotions, was wind over flame.
...

Innocent child and snow-white flower!
Well are ye paired in your opening hour.
Thus should the pure and the lovely meet,
Stainless with stainless, and sweet with sweet.
...

Stranger, if thou hast learned a truth which needs
No school of long experience, that the world
Is full of guilt and misery, and hast seen
Enough of all its sorrows, crimes, and cares,...

Love's worshippers alone can know
The thousand mysteries that are his;
His blazing torch, his twanging bow,
His blooming age are mysteries.
A charming science, but the day...

The earth was sown with early flowers,
The heavens were blue and bright,
I met a youthful cavalier
As lovely as the light.
I knew him not, but in my heart
His graceful image lies,...

Blessed, yet sinful one, and broken-hearted!
The crowd are pointing at the thing forlorn,
In wonder and in scorn!
Thou weepest days of innocence departed;
Thou weepest, and thy tears have power to move...

'Tis noon. At noon the Hebrew bowed the knee
And worshipped, while the husbandmen withdrew
From the scorched field, and the wayfaring man
Grew faint, and turned aside by bubbling fount,...

Far back in the ages,
The plough with wreaths was crowned;
The hands of kings and sages
Entwined the chaplet round;
Till men of spoil disdained the toil
By which the world was nourished,...

Oh fairest of the rural maids!
Thy birth was in the forest shades;
Green boughs, and glimpses of the sky,
Were all that met thy infant eye.

Thy sports, thy wanderings, when a child,...

Alexis calls me cruel;
The rifted crags that hold
The gathered ice of winter,
He says, are not more cold.

When even the very blossoms
Around the fountain's brim,
And forest walks, can witness...

To the town of Atienza, Molina's brave Alcayde,
The courteous and the valorous, led forth his bold brigade.
The Moor came back in triumph, he came without a wound,...