COMMUNION OF THE SEA AND SKY.
Reading edition
———
BY ELVIRA JONES.
———
It was a night whose starry ray
E’en matched the brilliant hue of day,
A night replete with gifts of June—
A flowery earth and silver moon.
Sleep softly waved her opiate rod,
And stilled all things on earth’s green sod.
The ocean slept, so gently breathing,
Scarce I marked its bosom’s heaving.
In em’rald couch the flow’rs reposed,
The violet’s azure eye was closed;
The balmy, odor-laden air
Scarce stirred beneath its burden rare,
Though oft a slumbering breeze would wake,
And on its harp sweet music make;
The list’ning waves would catch the lay,
With silver lutes so sweet they’d play
That e’en the peerless nightingale,
Warbling within some quiet vale,
Would cease his matchless melody,
To list, and dare no rivalry.
At last a swifter breeze did come
Down from its far off heavenly home;
Bright dew-drops on its wings it bore,
The fairest gems of midnight’s store;
O’er all the earth like stars they lie,
As if to imitate the sky;
Brighter than monarch’s sparkling gem
Was the lowly flow’ret’s diadem.
Methought indeed ’twas love’s own hour—
He could not choose a fairer bower—
A scene so still, so void of strife,
So stirless, yet replete with life.
A lily by a rose-bud stood,
Partaking of its honey food,
With tender and confiding grace
They waved to each a fond embrace.
A star in the far azure sky
Heard a murm’ring streamlet’s sigh,
His image in her bosom still
He saw, and blessed the gentle rill.
A zephyr sought the rose’s bower,
To serenade the lovely flower,
Yet all unlike the constant star,
He sees the streamlet from afar.
For her forsakes his tender rose,
To her his love would fain disclose;
She trembled at his light caress,
Yet kept the image in her breast.
Sudden a voice that came along,
As softly as a fairy’s song,
Or like the wind-harp’s faintest sigh,
That scarcely lives ere it doth die,
Folded the pinions of my thought,
And deep and mute attention brought—
’Twas the voice of the far off sky
Whisp’ring its scarce heard melody
To its kindred sea, whose list’ning waves
Scarce stirred within their azure caves.
“Ocean, sleepest thou thy nightly rest?
Or with thy weight of stars so prest,
Thou canst not hear my lay of love,
My wooing whispers from above?
Thy brilliant burden I will lift,
Awhile withdraw my nightly gift;
My graceful clouds shall intervene,
No more thy brilliant load is seen.
Now listen to my nightly song,
My voice unheard to mortal throng.
“How strange none mark our sympathy,
And yet how like I am to thee.
My voice to thee a passage finds
In music of the tuneful winds,
While soft thy murm’ring waves reply
With a sound more faint than joy’s sigh.
“I gaze at thee with eyes of light,
With loving look, from orbs as bright,
Thou answer’st me. My beams I send,
As messengers to thee. They lend
A golden chariot to thy waves,
In which they leave their dark blue caves
And joyously to me they come;
Though grieved to leave their native home,
In purple mansions here they dwell,
But mark thy bosom’s sorrowing swell,
And weary of their absence long,
Again they seek their home of song.
“Within thy bosom hidden lie,
Fair pearls unseen to mortal eye—
I, too, have jewels e’n more bright—
My dew-drop gems, which deck the night.
“In their blue home thy gold-fish rove—
I, too, have children whom to love,
My fairy birds who sport along,
Here in their happy world of song.”
The voice was still. The ocean sighed,
In harp-like tones its waves replied—
“Our converse, unperceived by men,
Still lasts, though sound is hushed, e’en then,
Though winds are still, nor waves rejoice,
I speak to thee in silence’s voice.
What gives to us our hue of love,
This azure tint, below, above?
It is our depth, unseen, profound,
In shallow-hearted man ne’er found.”
The voice of the sea was hushed.
A fairy cloud the heavens brushed,
And tears of joy the sky was weeping,
Aroused the wavelets lightly sleeping,
They sprang to meet so playfully,
A union ’twas of sea and sky.
THE BULLFINCH. Engraved expressly for Graham’s Magazine by F. Humphrys from an original drawing