-Communion with the dead!-I sent a cry
Through the veil'd empires of eternity,
A voice to cleave them! By the mournful truth,
By the lost promise of my blighted youth,
By the strong chain a mighty love can bind
On the beloved, the spell of mind o'er mind;
By words, which in themselves are magic high,
Arm'd, and inspired, and wing'd with agony;
By tears, which comfort not, but burn, and seem
To bear the heart's blood in their passion-stream;
I summon'd, I adjured!-with quicken'd sense,
With the keen vigil of a life intense,
I watch'd, an answer from the winds to wring,
I listen'd, if perchance the stream might bring
Token from worlds afar: I taught one sound
Unto a thousand echoes: one profound
Imploring accent to the tomb, the sky;
One prayer to night,-"Awake, appear, reply!"
Hast thou been told that from the viewless bourne,
The dark way never hath allow'd return?
That all, which tears can move, with life is fled,
That earthly love is powerless on the dead?
Believe it not!-there is a large lone star,
Now burning o'er yon western hill afar,
And under its clear light there lies a spot,
Which well might utter forth-Believe it not!
I sat beneath that planet,-I had wept
My woe to stillness; every night-wind slept;
A hush was on the hills; the very streams
Went by like clouds, or noiseless founts in dreams,
And the dark tree o'ershadowing me that hour,
Stood motionless, even as the grey church-tower
Whereon I gazed unconsciously:-there came
A low sound, like the tremour of a flame,
Or like the light quick shiver of a wing
Flitting through twilight woods, across the air;
And I look'd up!-Oh! for strong words to bring
Conviction o'er thy thought!-Before me there,
He, the Departed, stood!-Ay, face to face-
So near, and yet how far!-his form, his mien,
Gave to remembrance back each burning trace
Within:-Yet something awfully serene,
Pure, sculpture-like, -on the pale brow that wore
Of the once beating heart no token more;
And stillness on the lip-and o'er the hair
A gleam, that trembled through the breathless air;
And an unfathom'd calm, that seem'd to lie
In the grave sweetness of the illumined eye;
Told of the gulfs between our being set,
And, as that unsheathed spirit-glance I met,
Made my soul faint:-with fear?-Oh! not with
fear!
With the sick feeling that in his far sphere
My love could be as nothing!-But he spoke-
How shall I tell thee of the startling thrill
In that low voice, whose breezy tones could fill
My bosom's infinite?-O friend, I woke
Then first to heavenly life!-Soft, solemn, clear,
Breathed the mysterious accents on mine ear,
Yet strangely seem'd as if the while they rose
From depths of distance, o'er the wide repose
Of slumbering waters wafted, or the dells
Of mountains, hollow with sweet echo-cells;
But, as they murmur'd on, the mortal chill
Pass'd from me, like a mist before the morn,
And to that glorious intercourse upborne,
By slow degrees, a calm, divinely still,
Possess'd my frame:-I sought that lighted eye,-
From its intense and searching purity
I drank in soul!-I question'd of the dead-
Of the hush'd, starry shores their footsteps tread—
And I was answer'd:—if remembrance there,
With dreamy whispers fill the immortal air;
If Thought, here piled from many a jewel-heap,
Be treasure in that pensive land to keep;
If Love, o'ersweeping change, and blight, and blast,
Find there the music of his home at last;
I ask'd and I was answer'd;-Full and high
Was that communion with eternity,
Too rich for aught so fleeting!-Like a knell
Swept o'er my sense its closing words,-"Farewell,
On earth we meet no more!"—and all was gone-
The pale bright settled brow-the thrilling tone —
The still and shining eye!—and never more
May twilight gloom or midnight hush restore
That radiant guest!-One full-fraught hour of Heaven,
To earthly passion's wild implorings given,
Was made my own-the ethereal fire hath shiver'd
The fragile censer in whose mould it quiver'd,
Brightly, consumingly !—What now is left?—
A faded world, of glory's hues bereft,
A void, a chain!-I dwell 'midst throngs, apart,
In the cold silence of the stranger's heart;
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