Great Poems by American Women (3 page)

See how the black ship cleaves the main,

High bounding o'er the dark blue wave,

Remurmuring with the groans of pain,

Deep freighted with the princely slave!

 

Did all the gods of Afric sleep,

Forgetful of their guardian love,

When the white tyrants of the deep,

Betray'd him in the palmy grove?

 

A chief of Gambia's golden shore,

Whose arm the band of warriors led;

Or more-the lord of generous power,

By whom the foodless poor were fed.

 

Does not the voice of reason cry,

“Claim the first right that nature gave,

From the red scourge of bondage fly,

Nor deign to live a burden'd slave?”

 

Has not his suffering offspring clung,

Desponding, round his fetter'd knee;

On his worn shoulder, weeping hung,

And urged one effort to be free?

 

His wife by nameless wrongs subdued,

His bosom's friend to death resign'd;

The flinty path-way drench'd in blood;

He saw with cold and frenzied mind.

 

Strong in despair, he sought the plain,

To heaven was raised his steadfast eye,

Resolved to burst the crushing chain,

Or 'mid the battle's blast, to die.

 

First of his race, he led the band,

Guardless of danger, hurtling round,

Till by his red avenging hand,

Full many a despot stained the ground.

 

When erst Messenia's sons oppress'd,

Flew desperate to the sanguine field,

With iron clothed each injured breast,

And saw the cruel Spartan yield,

 

Did not the soul to heaven allied,

With the proud heart as greatly swell,

As when the Roman Decius died,

Or when the Grecian victim fell?

 

Do later deeds quick rapture raise,

The boon Batavia's William won,

Paoli's time-enduring praise,

Or the yet greater Washington?

 

If these exalt thy sacred zeal,

To hate oppression's mad control,

For bleeding Afric learn to feel,

Whose chieftain claimed a kindred soul.

 

Oh! mourn the last disastrous hour,

Lift the full eye of bootless grief,

While victory treads the sultry shore,

And tears from hope the captive chief.

 

While the hard race of pallid hue,

Unpractised in the power to feel,

Resign him to the murderous crew,

The horrors of the quivering wheel.

 

Let sorrow bathe each blushing cheek,

Bend piteous o'er the tortured slave,

Whose wrongs compassion cannot speak,

Whose only refuge was the grave.

How blest a life a sailor leads,
From clime to clime still ranging;
For as the calm the storm succeeds,
The scene delights by changing!
When tempests howl along the main,
Some object will remind us,
And cheer with hopes to meet again
Those friends we've left behind us.
Then, under snug sail, we laugh at the gale,
And though landsmen look pale, never heed 'em;
But toss off a glass to a favorite lass,
To America, commerce, and freedom!

 

And when arrived in sight of land,
Or safe in port rejoicing,
Our ship we moor, our sails we hand,
Whilst out the boat is hoisting.
With eager haste the shore we reach,
Our friends delighted greet us;
And, tripping lightly o‘er the beach,
The pretty lasses meet us.
When the full-flowing bowl has enlivened the soul,
To foot it we merrily lead 'em,
And each bonny lass will drink off a glass
To America, commerce, and freedom!

 

Our cargo sold, the chink we share,
And gladly we receive it;
And if we meet a brother tar
Who wants, we freely give it.
No freeborn sailor yet had store,
But cheerfully would lend it;
And when 't is gone, to sea for more—
We earn it but to spend it.
Then drink round, my boys, 't is the first of our joys
To relieve the distressed, clothe and feed 'em:
'T is a task which we share with the brave and the fair
In this land of commerce and freedom!

Old Time, thou'rt a sluggard; how long dost thou stay;

Say, where are the wings, with which poets adorn thee?

Sure ‘twas some happy being, who ne'er was away

From the friend he most loved, and who wished to have shorn thee,

First drew thee with pinions; for had he e'er known

A long separation, so slow dost thou move,

He'd have pictured thee lame, and with fetters bound down;

So tedious is absence to friendship and love.

 

I am sure thou'rt a cheat, for I often have wooed thee

To tarry, when blest with the friend of my heart:

But you vanished with speed, tho' I eager pursued thee,

Entreating thee not in such haste to depart.

Then, wretch, thou wast deaf, nor wouldst hear my petition,

But borrowed the wings of a sparrow or dove;

And now, when I wish thee to take thy dismission

Till those hours shall return, thou refusest to move.

The rose just bursting into bloom,

Admired where'er 'tis seen,

Dispenses round a rich perfume,

The garden's pride and queen;

But gathered from its native bed,

No longer charms the eye;

Its vivid tints are quickly fled,

'Twill wither, droop and die.

So woman, when by nature drest

In charms devoid of art,

Can reign sole empress in each breast,

Can triumph o'er each heart;

Can bid the soul to virtue rise,

To virtue prompt the brave;

But sinks oppressed, and drooping dies,

If once she's made a slave.

Rocked in the cradle of the deep
I lay me down in peace to sleep;
Secure I rest upon the wave,
For thou, O Lord! hast power to save.
I know thou wilt not slight my call,
For Thou dost mark the sparrow's fall;
And calm and peaceful shall I sleep,
Rocked in the cradle of the deep.

 

When in the dead of night I lie
And gaze upon the trackless sky,
The star-bespangled heavenly scroll,
The boundless waters as they roll,—
I feel thy wondrous power to save
From perils of the stormy wave:
Rocked in the cradle of the deep,
I calmly rest and soundly sleep.

 

And such the trust that still were mine,
Though stormy winds swept o'er the brine
Or though the tempest's fiery breath
Roused me from sleep to wreck and death
In ocean cave, still safe with Thee
The germ of immortality!
And calm and peaceful shall I sleep,
Rocked in the cradle of the deep.

The night was dark and fearful,

The blast swept wailing by;

A watcher, pale and tearful,

Looked forth with anxious eye:

How wistfully she gazes—

No gleam of morn is there!

And then her heart upraises

Its agony of prayer.

 

Within that dwelling lonely,

Where want and darkness reign,

Her precious child, her only,

Lay moaning in his pain;

And death alone can free him—

She feels that this must be:

“But oh! for morn to see him

Smile once again on me!'

 

A hundred lights are glancing

In yonder mansion fair,

And merry feet are dancing—

They heed not morning there:

Oh, young and lovely creatures,

One lamp, from out your store,

Would give that poor boy's features

To her fond gaze once more!

 

The morning sun is shining—

She heedeth not its ray;

Beside her dead reclining,

That pale, dead mother lay!

A smile her lip was wreathing,

A smile of hope and love,

As though she still were breathing—

“There's light for us above!”

“How can the red men be forgotten, while so many of our states and territories, bays, lakes and rivers, are indelibly stamped by names of their giving?”

 

Ye say they all have passed away,

That noble race and brave,

That their light canoes have vanished

From off the crested wave;

That 'mid the forests where they roamed

There rings no hunter shout,

But their names is on your waters,

Ye may not wash it out.

 

'Tis where Ontario's billow

Like Ocean's surge is curled,

Where strong Niagara's thunders wake

The echo of the world.

Where red Missouri bringeth

Rich tribute from the west,

And Rappahannock sweetly sleeps

On green Virginia's breast.

 

Ye say their cone-like cabins,

That clustered o'er the vale,

Have fled away like withered leaves

Before the autumn gale,

But their memory liveth on your hills,

Their baptism on your shore,

Your everlasting rivers speak

Their dialect of yore.

 

Old Massachusetts wears it,

Within her lordly crown,

And broad Ohio bears it,

Amid his young renown;

Connecticut hath wreathed it

Where her quiet foliage waves,

And bold Kentucky breathed it hoarse

Through all her ancient caves.

 

Wachuset hides its lingering voice

Within his rocky heart,

And Alleghany graves its tone

Throughout his lofty chart;

Monadnock on his forehead hoar

Doth seal the sacred trust,

Your mountains build their monument,

Though ye destroy their dust.

 

Ye call these red-browed brethren

The insects of an hour,

Crushed like the noteless worm amid

The regions of their power;

Ye drive them from their father's lands,

Ye break of faith the seal,

But can ye from the court of Heaven

Exclude their last appeal?

 

Ye see their unresisting tribes,

With toilsome step and slow,

On through the trackless desert pass,

A caravan of woe;

Think ye the Eternal's ear is deaf?

His sleepless vision dim?

Think ye the
soul's blood
may not cry

From that far land to him?

First of that train which cursed the wave,

And from the rifled cabin bore,

Inheritor of wo,—
the slave

To bless his palm-tree's shade no more.

 

Dire engine!—o'er the troubled main

Borne on in unresisted state,—

Know'st thou within thy dark domain

The secrets of thy prison'd freight?—

 

Hear'st thou
their
moans whom hope hath fled?—

Wild cries, in agonizing starts?—

Know'st thou thy humid sails are spread

With ceaseless sighs from broken hearts?—

 

The fetter'd chieftain's burning tear,—

The parted lover's mute despair,—

The childless mother's pang severe,—

The orphan's misery, are there.

 

Ah!—could'st thou from the scroll of fate

The annal read of future years,

Stripes,—tortures,—unrelenting hate.

And death-gasps drown'd in slavery's tears.

 

Down,—down,—beneath the cleaving main

Thou fain would'st plunge where monsters lie,

Rather than ope the gates of pain

For time and for Eternity.—

Oh Afric!—what has been thy crime?—

That thus like Eden's fratricide,

A mark is set upon thy clime,

And every brother shuns thy side.—

 

Yet are thy wrongs, thou long-distrest!—

Thy burdens, by the world unweigh'd,

Safe in that
Unforgetful Breast

Where all the sins of earth are laid. -

 

Poor outcast stave!—Our guilty land

Should tremble while she drinks thy tears,

Or sees in vengeful silence stand,

The beacon of thy shorten'd years;—

 

Should shrink to hear her sons proclaim

The sacred truth that heaven is just,—

Shrink even at her Judge's name,—

“Jehovah,—Saviour of the opprest.”

 

The Sun upon thy forehead frown'd,

But Man more cruel far than he,

Dark fetters on thy spirit bound:—

Look to the mansions of the free!

 

Look to that realm where chains unbind,—

Where the pale tyrant drops his rod,

And where the patient sufferers find

A friend,—a father in their God.

Above them spread a stranger sky;

Around, the sterile plain;

The rock-bound coast rose frowning nigh;

Beyond,—the wrathful main:

Chill remnants of the wintry snow

Still choked the encumbered soil,

Yet forth those Pilgrim Fathers go

To mark their future toil.

 

'Mid yonder vale their corn must rise

In summer's ripening pride,

And there the church-spire woo the skies

Its sister-school beside.

Perchance mid England's velvet green

Some tender thought reposed,

Though nought upon their stoic mien

Such soft regret disclosed.

 

When sudden from the forest wide

A red-browed chieftain came,

With towering form, and haughty stride,

And eye like kindling flame:

No wrath he breathed, no conflict sought,

To no dark ambush drew,

But simply to the Old World brought

The welcome of the New.

 

That welcome was a blast and ban

Upon thy race unborn;

Was there no seer,—thou fated Man!—

Thy lavish zeal to warn?

Thou in thy fearless faith didst hail

A weak, invading band,

But who shall heed thy children's wail

Swept from their native land?

 

Thou gav'st the riches of thy streams,

The lordship o'er thy waves,

The region of thine infant dreams

And of thy father's graves,—

But who to yon proud mansions, piled

With wealth of earth and sea,

Poor outcast from thy forest wild,

Say, who shall welcome thee?

From a bright hearth-stone of our land,

A beam hath pass'd away,

A smile, whose cheering influence seem'd

Like morning to the day;

A sacrificing spirit

With innate goodness fraught,

That ever for another's weal

Employ'd its fervid thought.

 

That beam is gather'd back again

To the Pure Fount of flame,

That smile the Blessed Source hath found,

From whence its radiance came,—

That spirit hath a genial clime;

And yet, methinks, 't will bend

Sometimes, amid familiar haunts,

Beside the mourning friend.

 

Yet better 't were to pass away,

Ere evening shadows fell,

To wrap in chillness, and decay,

What here was loved so well;

And strew unwither'd flowers around,

When the last footsteps part,

And leave in every nook of home,

Sweet memories for the heart.

Toll!—Toll!—Toll!

Thou bell by billows swung,

And night and day thy warning lore

Repeat with mournful tongue:

Toll for the queenly boat,

Wrecked on yon rocky shore;

Sea-weed is in her palace halls,

She rides the surge no more.

 

Toll for the master bold,

The high-souled and the brave,

Who ruled her like a thing of life

Amid the crested wave;

Toll for the hardy crew,

Sons of the storm and blast,

Who long the tyrant Ocean dared—

It vanquished them at last.

 

Toll for the man of God,

Whose hallowed voice of prayer

Rose calm above the gathered groan

Of that intense despair,—

How precious were those tones

On the sad verge of life,

Amid the fierce and freezing storm,

And the mountain-billows' strife!

 

Toll for the lover lost

To the gay bridal train—

Bright glows a picture on his breast,

Beneath the unfathomed main;—

One from her casement bendeth

Long, o'er the misty sea,—

He cometh not—pale maiden—

His heart is cold to thee.

 

Toll for the absent sire,

Who to his home drew near

To bless that glad expecting group—

Fond wife, and children dear.

They heap the blazing hearth,

The festal board is spread,

But a fearful guest is at the gate,—

Room for the sheeted dead!

 

Toll for the loved and fair,

The whelmed beneath the tide,

The broken harps, around whose strings

The dull sea-monsters glide.

Mother, and nursling sweet

Reft from the household throng,

There's bitter weeping in the nest

Where breathed their soul of song.

 

Toll for the hearts that bleed,

'Neath misery's furrowed trace,

For the lone, hapless orphan, left

The last of all his race.

Yea, with thine heaviest knell,

From surge to echoing shore,

Toll for the living—not the dead

Whose mortal woes are o'er.

 

Toll! Toll!—Toll

O'er breeze and billow free,

And with thy startling voice instruct

Each rover of the sea;

Tell how o'er proudest joys

May swift destruction sweep,

And bid him build his hopes on high,

Lone teacher of the deep.