And there was mirth too!—strange and savage mirth,
More fearful far than all the woes of earth!
The laughter of cold hearts, and scoffs that spring
From minds to which there is no sacred thing,
And transient bursts of fierce, exulting glee,
The lightning's flash upon its blasted tree!
But still, howe'er the soul's disguise were worn,
If from wild revelry, or haughty scorn,
Or buoyant hope, it won an outward show,
Slight was the mask, and all beneath it—woe.
Yet was this all?—amidst the dungeon-gloom,
The void, the stillness, of the captive's doom,
Were there no deeper thoughts?—and that dark Power,
To whom Guilt owes one late, but dreadful hour,
The mighty debt through years of crime delay'd,
But, as the grave's, inevitably paid;
Came he not thither, in his burning force,
The lord, the tamer of dark souls—Remorse?
Yes! as the night calls forth from sea and sky,
From breeze and wood, a solemn harmony;
Lost, when the swift, triumphant wheels of day,
In light and sound, are hurrying on their way:
Thus, from the deep recesses of the heart,
The voice that sleeps, but never dies, might start,
Call'd up by solitude, each nerve to thrill,
With accents heard not, save when all is still!
The voice, inaudible, when Havoc's train
Crush'd the red vintage of devoted Spain;
Mute, when Sierras to the war-whoop rung,
And the broad light of conflagration sprung,
From the South's marble cities;-hush'd, midst cries
That told the heavens of mortal agonies;
But gathering silent strength, to wake at last,
In the concentred thunders of the Past.
And there, perchance, some long-bewilder'd mind
Torn from its lowly sphere, its path conſin'd,
Page:Hemans in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 11 1822.pdf/5
