To Mrs. J.S. Blackie
Dear Friend, once, in a dream, I, looking o'er
The Past, saw the Four Seasons slow advance
Dancing, and, dancing, each her cognizance
So gave and took that neither dancer bore
Her sign, but in another's symbol wore
An amulet to lessen or enhance
Herself: till as they fast and faster dance
I see a dance and lose the dancing four.
Thus thy dear Poet, at his sportive will,
Commingling every seasonable mood
Of old and young, and the peculiar ill
Of each still healing with the other's good,
Bends to a circle life's proverbial span
Where childhood, youth, and age are unity in man.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Voxpopuli
What if the Turk be foul or fair? Is't known
That the sublime Samaritan of old
Withheld his hand till the bruised wretch had told
His creed? Your neighbour's roof is but a shed,
Yet if he burns shall not the flame enfold
Your palace? Saving his, you save your own.
Oh ye who fall that Liberty may stand,
The light of coming ages shines before
Upon your graves! Oh ye immortal band,
Whether ye wrestled with this Satan o'er
A dead dog, or the very living head
Of Freedom, every precious drop ye bled
Is holy. 'Tis not for his broken door
That the stern goodman shoots the burglar dead.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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On A Recently Finished Statue
Said Sculptor to immaculate marble-'Show
Thine essence; into necessary space
Most pure describe thine unshaped Purity!'
And lo this Image! As a bubble blown,
Swiftly her charms, dilating, went through all
The zones of sphered Perfection, till the stone
Smiled as to speak. Some coming thought half-shown
Forms on her parting lips, so that her face
Is as a white flow'r whence a drop of dew,
White with the fragrant flow'r, inclines to fall.
'Oh Everlasting Silence keep her so!
Immortalise this moment, lest she grow
To such a living substance as can die!'
He cried. Consent Eternal heard his cry.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Czar Nicholas
We could not turn from that colossal foe,
The morning shadow of whose hideous head
Darkened the furthest West, and who did throw
His evening shade on Ind. The polar bow
Behind him flamed and paled, and through the red
Uncertain dark his vasty shape did grow
Upon the sleepless nations. Lay him low!
Aye, low as for our priceless English dead
We lie and groan to-day in England! Oh,
My God! I think Thou hast not finished
This Thy fair world, where, triumph Ill or Good,
We still must weep; where or to lose or gain
Is woe; where Pain is medicined by Pain,
And Blood can only be washed out by Blood.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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To The Authoress Of
Were Shakspeare born a twin, his lunar twin
(Not of the golden but the silver bow)
Should be like thee: so, with such eyes and brow,
Sweeten his looks, so, with her dear sex in
His voice, (a king's words writ out by the queen,)
Unman his bearded English, and, with flow
Of breastfull robes about her female snow,
Present the lordly brother. Oh Last-of-kin,
There be ambitious women here on earth
Who will not thank thee to have sung so well!
Apollo and Diana are one birth,
Pollux and Helen break a single shell.
Who now may hope? While Adam was alone
Eve was to come. She came; God's work was done.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Esse Et Posse
The groan of fallen Hosts; a torrid glare
Of cities; battle-cries of Right and Wrong
Where armies shout to rocking fleets that roar
On thundering oceans to the thundering shore,
And high o'er all-long, long prolonged, along
The moaning caverns of the plaining air,-
The cry of conscious Fate. The firmament
Waves from above me like a tattered flag;
And as a soldier in his lowly tent
Looks up when a shot strikes the helpless rag
From o'er him, and beholds the canopy
Of Heaven, so, sudden to my startled eye,
The Heavens that shall be! The dream fades. I stand
Among the mourners of a mourning land.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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L'Avenir
I saw the human millions as the sand
Unruffled on the starlit wilderness.
The day was near, and every star grew less
In universal dawn. Then woke a band
Of wheeling winds, and made a mighty stress
Of morning weather; and still wilder went
O'er shifting plains, till, in their last excess,
A whirlwind whirled across the whirling land.
Heaven blackened over it; a voice of woes
Foreran it; the great noise of clanging foes
Hurtled behind; beneath the earth was rent,
And howling Death, like an uncaverned beast,
Leaped from his lair. Meanwhile morn oped the East,
And thro' the dusty tumult God arose.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Samuel Brown
He came with us to thy great gates, oh Thou
Unopened Age. Our noise was like the wind
Chafing the wordy Deep; but broad and blind
They stood unmoved. Then He,-we knew not how,-
Laid forth his hand upon them. Lo, they grind
Revolving thunders! Lo, on his dark brow
The unknown light! Lo
Azrael came behind
And touched him. They clanged back, and all was Now.
We wondered and forgot; but He, unbent,
With eye still strained to the forbidden day,
Towered in the likeness of his great intent
As if his act should be his monument,
Till Azrael pitied such sublime dismay,
And led him onward by another way.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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Warning
Virtue is Virtue, writ in ink or blood.
And Duty, Honour, Valour, are the same
Whether they cheer the thundering steps of Fame
Up echoing hills of Alma, or, more blest,
Walk with her in that band where she is least
Thro' smiling plains and cities doing good.
Yet, oh to sing them in their happier day!
Yon glebe is not the hind whose manhood mends
Its rudeness, yet it gains but while he spends,
And mulcts him rude. Even that sinless Lord
Whose feet wan Mary washed, went not His way
Uncoloured by the Galilean field;
And Honour, Duty, Valour, seldom wield
With stainless hand the immedicable sword.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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The Botanist's Vision
The sun that in Breadalbane's lake doth fall
Was melting to the sea down golden Tay,
When a cry came along the peopled way,
'Sebastopol is ours!' From that wild call
I turned, and leaning on a time-worn wall
Quaint with the touch of many an ancient day,
The mappèd mould and mildewed marquetry
Knew with my focussed soul; which bent down all
Its sense, power, passion, to the sole regard
Of each green minim, as it were but born
To that one use. I strode home stern and hard;
In my hot hands I laid my throbbing head,
And all the living world and all the dead
Began a march which did not end at morn.
poem by Sydney Thompson Dobell
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