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Voyage of the Jettie

A shallow stream, from fountains
Deep in the Sandwich mountains,
Ran lake ward Bearcamp River;
And, between its flood-torn shores,
Sped by sail or urged by oars
No keel had vexed it ever.

Alone the dead trees yielding
To the dull axe Time is wielding,
The shy mink and the otter,
And golden leaves and red,
By countless autumns shed,
Had floated down its water.

From the gray rocks of Cape Ann,
Came a skilled seafaring man,
With his dory, to the right place;
Over hill and plain he brought her,
Where the boatless Beareamp water
Comes winding down from White-Face.

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poem by John Greenleaf Whittier
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A Border Burn

Where Autumn runnels fret and foam
Past banks of amber fern,
Since track was none I chanced to roam
Along a Border burn.

The rain was gone, the winds were furled,
No cloud was in the sky,
So that there seemed in all the world
Only the stream and I.

At length upon a grey-green stone
I sate me down to dream,
Till, with its flow familiar grown,
I thus addressed the stream:

``Dear Border Burn, that had your birth
Where hills stand bright and high,
Whose lowlier parent is the earth,
Whose loftier the sky;

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poem by Alfred Austin
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Cathloda — Duan III

Ossian, after some general reflections, describes the situation of Fingal, and the position of the army of Lochlin. — The conversation of Starno and Swaran. — The episode of Corman-trunar and Foina-bragal. — Starno, from his own example, recommends to Swaran to surprise Fingal, who had retired alone to a neighboring hill. Upon Swaran's refusal, Starno undertakes the enterprise himself, is overcome and taken prisoner by Fingal. He is dismissed after a severe reprimand for his cruelty.

*

WHENCE is the stream of years? Whither do they roll along? Where have they hid, in mist, their many colored sides.

I look unto the times of old, but they seem dim to Ossian's eyes, like reflected moonbeams on a distant lake. Here rise the red beams of war! There, silent dwells a feeble race! They mark no years with their deeds, as slow they pass along. Dweller between the shields! thou that awakest the failing soul! descend from thy wall, harp of Cona, with thy voices three! Come with that which kindles the past: rear the forms of old, on their own dark-brown years!

U-thorno, hill of storms, I behold my race on thy side. Fingal is bending in night over Duthmaruno's tomb. Near him are the steps of his heroes, hunters of the boar. By Turthor's stream the host of Lochlin is deep in shades. The wrathful kings stood on two hills: they looked forward on their bossy shields. They looked forward to the stars of night, red wandering in the west. Cruth-loda bends from high, like formless meteor in clouds. He sends abroad the winds and marks them with his signs. Starno foresaw that Morven's king was not to yield in war.

He twice struck the tree in wrath. He rushed before his son. He hummed a surly song, and heard his air in wind. Turned from one another, they stood like two oaks, which different winds had bent; each hangs over his own loud rill, and shakes his boughs in the course of blasts.

" Annir," said Starno of lakes, "was a fire that consumed of old. He poured death from his eyes along the striving fields. His joy was in the fall of men. Blood to him was a summer stream, that brings joy to the withered vales, from its own mossy rock. He came forth to the lake Luth-cormo, to meet the tall Corman-trunar, he from Urlor of streams, dweller of battle's wing."

The chief of Urlor had come to Gormal with his dark-bosomed ships. He saw the daughter of Annir, white-armed Foina-bragal. He saw her! Nor careless rolled her eyes on the rider of stormy waves. She fled to his ship in darkness, like a moonbeam through a nightly veil. Annir pursued along the deep; he called the winds of heaven. Nor alone was the king! Starno was by his side. Like U-thorno's young eagle, I turned my eyes on my father.

We rushed into roaring Urlor. With his people came tall Corman-trunar. We fought; but the foe prevailed. In his wrath my father stood. He lopped the young trees with his sword. His eyes rolled red in his rage. I marked the soul of the king, and I retired in night. From the field I took a broken helmet; a shield that was pierced with steel; pointless was the spear in my hand. I went to find the foe.

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poem by James Macpherson
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Sul-Malla Of Lumon.

This poem, which, properly speaking, is a continuation of the last, opens with an address to Sul-malla, the daughter of the king of Inis-huna, whom Ossian met at the chase, as he returned from the battle of Rath-col. Sul-malla invites Ossian and Oscar to a feast, at the residence of her father, who was then absent on the wars. Upon hearing their names and family, she relates an expedition of Fingal into Inis-huna. She casually mentioning Cathmor, chief of Atha, (who then assisted her father against his enemies,) Ossian introduces the episode of Culgorm and Suran-dronlo, two Scandinavian kings, in whose wars Ossian himself and Cathmor were engaged on opposite sides. The story is imperfect, a part of the original being lost. Ossian, warned in a dream by the ghost of Trenmor, sets sail from Inis-huna.

WHO moves so stately on Lumon, at the roar of the foamy waters? Her hair falls upon her heaving breast. White is her arm behind, as slow she bends the bow. Why dost thou wander in deserts, like a light through a cloudy field? The young roes are panting by their secret rocks. Return, thou daughter of kings! the cloudy night is near! It was the young branch of green Inishuna, Sul-malla of blue eyes. She sent the bard from her rock to bid us to her feast. Amidst the song we sat down in Cluba's echoing hall. White moved the hands of Sul-malla on the trembling strings. Half-heard amidst the sound, was the name of Atha's king: he that was absent in battle for her own green land. Nor absent from her soul was he: he came 'midst her thoughts by night. Ton-thena looked in from the sky, and saw her tossing arms.

The sound of shells had ceased. Amidst long locks Sul-malla rose. She spoke with bended eyes, and asked of our course through seas; "for of the kings of men are ye, tall riders of the wave." "Not unknown," I said, "at his streams is he, the father of our race. Fingal has been heard of at Cluba, blue-eyed daughter of kings. Not only at Crona's stream is Ossian and Oscar known. Foes tremble at our voice and shrink in other lands."

"Not unmarked," said the maid, "by Sul-malla, is the shield of Morven's king. It hangs high in my father's hall, in memory of the past, when Fingal came to Cluba, in the days of other years. Loud roared the boar of Culdarnu, in the midst of his rocks and woods. Inis-huna sent her youths; but they failed, and virgins wept over tombs. Careless went Fingal to Culdarnu. On his spear rolled the strength of the woods. He was bright, they said, in his locks, the first of mortal men. Nor at the feast were heard his words. His deeds passed from his soul of fire, like the rolling of vapors from the face of the wandering sun. Not careless looked the blue eyes of Cluba on his stately steps. In white bosoms rose the king of Selma, in the midst of their thoughts by night. But the winds bore the stranger to the echoing vales of his roes. Nor lost to other lands was he, like a meteor, that sinks in a cloud. He came forth, at times in his brightness, to the distant dwelling of foes. His fame came, like the sound of winds, to Cluba's woody vale.

"Darkness dwells in Cluba of harps! the race of kings is distant far: in battle is my father Conmor; and Lormar, my brother, king of streams. Nor darkening alone are they; a beam from other lands is nigh; the friend of strangers in Atha, the troubler of the field. High from their misty hills looks forth the blue eyes of Erin, for he is far away, young dweller of their souls! Nor harmless, white hands of Erin! is Cathmor in the skirts of war; he rolls ten thousand before him in his distant field."

"Not unseen by Ossian," I said, "rushed Cathmor from his streams, when he poured his strength on I-thorno, isle of many waves! In strife met two kings in I-thorno, Culgorm and Suran-dronlo: each from his echoing isle, stern hunters of the boar!

"They met a boar at a foamy stream; each pierced him with his spear. They strove for the fame of the deed, and gloomy battle rose. From isle to isle they sent a spear broken and stained with blood, to call the friends of their fathers in their sounding arms. Cathmor came from Erin to Colgorm, red-eyed king; I aided Suran-dronlo in his land of boars.

"We rushed on either side of a stream, which roared through a blasted heath. High broken rocks were round with all their bending trees. Near were two circles of Loda, with the stone of power, where spirits descended by night in dark-red streams of fire. There, mixed with the murmur of waters, rose the voice of aged men; they called the forms of night to aid them in their war.

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poem by James Macpherson
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The Princes' Quest - Part the Ninth

And passing through the city he went out
Into the fat fields lying thereabout,
And lo the spirit of the emerald stone
With secret influence to himself unknown
Guided the wandering of his errant feet,
The servants of the errant soul; and sweet
The meadows were, with babble of birds, and noise
Of brooks, the water's voice and the wind's voice.
Howbeit he gave small heed to any of them;
And now the subtile spirit of the gem
Led him along a winding way that ran
Beyond the fields to where the woods began
To spread green matwork for the mountains' feet;
A region where the Silence had her seat
And hearkened to the sounds that only she
Can hear-the fall of dew on herb and tree;
The voice of the growing of the grass; the night
Down-fluttering breathless from the heaven's height;
And autumn whispering unawares at times
Strange secrets and dark sayings, wrapt in rhymes

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poem by William Watson
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The Land of Promise: a Fable

I.

A pilgrim folk, o'er leagues of pathless sand
Long journeying patiently from far away,
Lured by the promise of a fairer land,
Reach'd ere the close of one eventful day
The craggy shore of a capacious stream:
And lo! the Promised Land before them lay
All in a golden sunset, whose last gleam
Reveal'd between the rovers and their rest
No barrier save that river's bridgeless breast.

II.

Each sufferer, sick and footsore from the waste,
Hail'd with reviving hope the blissful sight.
About the river-beach they pitch'd in haste
Their evening tents, and roam'd in dreams all night
The Land of Promise. At the dawn, however,

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poem by Edward Bulwer-Lytton from Littell's Living Age, Volume 157, Issue 2028
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A Spirit's Return

……..'This is to be a mortal,
And seek the things beyond mortality!' ~ Manfred.

Thy voice prevails - dear friend, my gentle friend!
This long-shut heart for thee shall be unsealed,
And though thy soft eye mournfully will bend
Over the troubled stream, yet once revealed
Shall its freed waters flow; then rocks must close
For evermore, above their dark repose.

Come while the gorgeous mysteries of the sky
Fused in the crimson sea of sunset lie;
Come to the woods, where all strange wandering sound
Is mingled into harmony profound;
Where the leaves thrill with spirit, while the wind
Fills with a viewless being, unconfined,
The trembling reeds and fountains - our own dwell,
With its green dimness and AEolian breath,
Shall suit the unveiling of dark records well -

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poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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The Creek of the Four Graves [Late Version]

A settler in the olden times went forth
With four of his most bold and trusted men
Into the wilderness—went forth to seek
New streams and wider pastures for his fast
Increasing flocks and herds. O’er mountain routes
And over wild wolds clouded up with brush,
And cut with marshes perilously deep,—
So went they forth at dawn; at eve the sun,
That rose behind them as they journeyed out,
Was firing with his nether rim a range
Of unknown mountains, that like ramparts towered
Full in their front. and his last glances fell
Into the gloomy forest’s eastern glades
In golden gleams, like to the Angel’s sword,
And flashed upon the windings of a creek
That noiseless ran betwixt the pioneers
And those new Apennines—ran, shaded o’er
With boughs of the wild willow, hanging mixed
From either-bank, or duskily befringed
With upward tapering feathery swamp-oaks,

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poem by Charles Harpur
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The Sensitive Plant

PART 1.
A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew,
And the young winds fed it with silver dew,
And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light.
And closed them beneath the kisses of Night.

And the Spring arose on the garden fair,
Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere;
And each flower and herb on Earth’s dark breast
Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest.

But none ever trembled and panted with bliss
In the garden, the field, or the wilderness,
Like a doe in the noontide with love’s sweet want,
As the companionless Sensitive Plant.

The snowdrop, and then the violet,
Arose from the ground with warm rain wet,
And their breath was mixed with fresh odour, sent
From the turf, like the voice and the instrument.

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poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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The Birth of The War-God (Canto Sixth ) - Uma's Espousals

Now gentle Umá bade a damsel bear
To Śiva, Soul of All, her maiden prayer:
'Wait the high sanction of Himálaya's will,
And ask his daughter from the royal hill.'
Then ere the God, her own dear Lord, replied,
In blushing loveliness she sought his side.
Thus the young mango hails the approaching spring
By its own tuneful bird's sweet welcoming.
In Umá's ear he softly whispered, yea,
Then scarce could tear him from her arms away.
Swift with a thought he summoned from above
The Seven bright Saints to bear his tale of love.
They came, and She, the Heavenly Dame, was there,
Lighting with glories all the radiant air;
Just freshly bathed in sacred Gangá's tide,
Gemmed with the dancing flowers that deck her side,
And richly scented with the nectarous rill
That heavenly elephants from their brows distil.
Fair strings of pearl their radiant fingers hold,
Clothed are their limbs in hermit-coats of gold;

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poem by Kalidasa
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