Say, are the gifted born the sons of woe—
The favoured ones on whom kind Heaven hath smiled,
And dowered so richly with its priceless store;
The lords of earth, the monarchs of the soil—
Men who are bless'd with minds that angels have:
Are these to bear the jibe of vulgar tongues,
To feel the taunts fell Envy madly hurls,
Or brook the scorn gaunt Jealousy may show?
To them such things are but the angry blast
That mars the bosom of the placid lake,
Which smiles in dimpling ripples at its wrath!
They have their "world of flower, and song, and gem,"
The land of beauty where the poet dwells—
His green Parnassus where the muses reign:
Not hidden nor unseen; oh! look abroad,
And tell me if thine eye no beauty sees.
The solemn grandeur of the Autumn woods,
Bright-crimsoned with the dying Summer's blood;
The mountains in their hoary splendour drest,
The valleys with their fields of golden grain,
The glens deep hidden, where a thousand flowers
In modest beauty shun the noontide glare;
The wild-birds' song, the murmur of the streams
That through their heathery banks of fragrance glide.
All these are theirs—their solace, their delight;
Each with its charm of mystic beauty fraught;
The gleams that pierce the clouds of common life,
And let the light of Heaven's own sunshine in!
They have their dreams in twilight's shadowy hour,
When they can strike their golden lyre, and feel
The holy joy the poet calls his own.
And the soft breeze that sings among the boughs
In numbers like the famed Æolian harp
Seems blending with its tones, till earthly cares
Melt, as beneath the syren's spell, and die!

Thus lightly o'er the waves his bark goes on,
Hope for a beacon shining bright above.
While firmly at the helm stands fair Content
To steer him safely till he reach the shore.
And then, when Death's grim portals open wide,
And he has reached the Land he dreamed and sung,
Oh! bliss to wander o'er the streets of gold,
His harp-notes mingling with the choirs of Heaven!
His hopes all realized, "faith lost in sight"—
His life a poem which God Himself hath read!