By That Lake, Whose Gloomy Shore
By that Lake, whose gloomy shore
Sky-lark never warbles o'er,
Where the cliff hangs high and steep,
Young Saint Kevin stole to sleep.
"Here, at least," he calmly said,
"Woman ne'er shall find my bed."
Ah! the good Saint little knew
What that wily sex can do.
'Twas from Kathleen's eyes he flew --
Eyes of most unholy blue!
She had loved him well and long,
Wish'd him hers, nor thought it wrong.
Wheresoe'er the Saint would fly,
Still he heard her light foot nigh;
East or west, where'er he turn'd,
Still her eyes before him burn'd.
On the bold cliff's bosom cast,
Tranquil now he sleeps at last;
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poem by Thomas Moore
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The Wandering Bard
What life like that of the bard can be --
The wandering bard, who roams as free
As the mountain lark that o'er him sings,
And, like that lark a music brings,
Within him, where'er he comes or goes --
A fount that for ever flows!
The world's to him like some playground,
Where fairies dance their moonlight round; --
It dimm'd the turf where late they trod;
The elves but seek some greener sod;
So, when less bright his scene of glee,
To another away flies he!
Oh, what would have been young Beauty's doom
Without a bard to fix her bloom?
They tell us, in the moon's bright round,
Things lost in this dark world are found;
So charms, on earth long pass'd and gone,
In the poet's lay live on. --
Would you have smiles that ne'er grow dim?
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poem by Thomas Moore
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Epistle Of Condolence From A Slave-Lord To A Cotton-Lord
Alas ! my dear friend, what a state of affairs !
How unjustly we both are despoil'd of our rights !
Not a pound of black flesh shall I leave to my heirs,
Nor must you any more work to death little whites.
Both forced to submit to that general controller
Of King, Lords, and cotton-mills Public Opinion ;
No more shall you beat with a big billy-roller,
Nor I with the cart-whip assert my dominion.
Whereas, were we suffered to do as we please
With our Blacks and our Whites, as of yore we were let,
We might range them alternate, like harpsichord keys,
And between us thump out a good piebald duet.
But this fun is all over; farewell to the zest
Which Slavery now lends to each cup we sip ;
Which makes still the cruellest coffee the best,
And that sugar the sweetest which smacks of the whip.
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poem by Thomas Moore
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Linda To Hafed
FROM 'THE FIRE-WORSHIPPERS.'
'How sweetly,' said the trembling maid,
Of her own gentle voice afraid,
So long had they in silence stood,
Looking upon that moonlight flood,--
'How sweetly does the moonbeam smile
To-night upon yon leafy isle!
Oft in my fancy's wanderings,
I've wished that little isle had wings,
And we, within its fairy bowers,
Were wafted off to seas unknown,
Where not a pulse should beat but ours,
And we might live, love, die alone!
Far from the cruel and the cold,--
Where the bright eyes of angels only
Should come around us, to behold
A paradise so pure and lonely!
Would this be world enough for thee?'--
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poem by Thomas Moore
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Dialogue Between a Sovereign and a One-Pound Note
Said a Sov'reign to a Note,
In the pocket of my coat,
Where they met in a neat purse of leather,
"How happens it, I prithee,
That though I'm wedded with thee,
Fair Pound, we can never live together?
Like your sex, fond of change,
With silver you can range,
And of lots of young sixpences be mother;
While with me -- upon my word
Not my Lady and my Lord
Of W--stm--th see so little of each other!"
The indignant Note replied
(Lying crumpled by his side),
"Shame, shame, it is yourself that roam, Sir --
One cannot look askance,
But, whip! you're off to France,
Leaving nothing but old rags at home, Sir.
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poem by Thomas Moore
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Ode to the Sublime Porte
Great Sultan, how wise are thy state compositions!
And oh, above all, I admire that Decree,
In which thou command'st, that all she politicians
Shall forthwith be strangled and cast in the sea.
'Tis my fortune to know a lean Benthamite spinster --
A maid, who her faith in old Jeremy puts;
Who talks, with a lisp, of the "last new Westminster,"
And hopes you're delighted with "Mill upon Gluts";
Who tells you how clever one Mr. Fun-blank is,
How charming his Articles 'gainst the Nobility; --
And assures you that even a gentleman's rank is,
In Jeremy's school, of no sort of utility.
To see her, ye Gods, a new number perusing --
Art. 1 - "On the Needle's variations", by Pl--e;
Art. 2 - By her fav'rite Fun-blank - so amusing!
"Dear man! he makes poetry quite a Law case."
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poem by Thomas Moore
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An Incantation
Come with me, and we will blow
Lots of bubbles, as we go;
Bubbles bright as ever Hope
Drew from fancy -- or from soap;
Bright as e'er the South Sea sent
from its frothy element!
Come with me, and we will blow
Lots of bubbles, as we go.
Mix the lather, Johnny W--lks,
Thou, who rhym'st so well to bilks;
Mix the lather - who can be
Fitter for such task than thee,
Great M.P. for Sudsbury!
For the frothy charm is ripe,
Puffing Peter bring thy pipe, --
Thou, whom ancient Coventry,
Once so dearly lov'd, that she
Knew not which to her was sweeter,
Peeping Tom or Puffing Peter; --
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poem by Thomas Moore
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The Parallel
Yes, sad one of Sion, if closely resembling,
In shame and in sorrow, thy wither'd-up heart --
If drinking deep, deep, of the same "cup of trembling"
Could make us thy children, our parent thou art.
Like thee doth our nation lie conquer'd and broken,
And fall'n from her head is the once royal crown;
In her streets, in her halls, Desolation hath spoken,
And "while it is day yet, her sun hath gone down."
Like thine doth her exile, 'mid dreams of returning,
Die far from the home it were life to behold;
Like thine do her sons, in the day of their mourning
Remember the bright things that bless'd them of old.
Ah, well may we call her, like thee, "the Forsaken,"
Her boldest are vanquish'd, her proudest are slaves;
And the harps of her minstrels, when gayest they waken,
Have tones 'mid their mirth like the wind over graves!
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poem by Thomas Moore
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Corn and Catholics
"What! still those two infernal questions,
That with our meals our slumbers mix --
That spoil our tempers and digestions --
Eternal Corn and Catholics!
Gods! were there ever two such bores?
Nothing else talk'd of night or morn --
Nothing in doors, or out of doors,
But endless Catholics and Corn!
Never was such a brace of pests --
While Ministers, still worse than either,
Skill'd but in feathering their nests,
Plague us with both, and settle neither.
So addled in my cranium meet
Popery and Corn, that oft I doubt,
Whether this year, 'twas bonded Wheat
Or bonded Papists, they let out.
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poem by Thomas Moore
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The Lake of the Dismal Swamp
'THEY made her a grave too cold and damp
For a soul so warm and true;
And she's gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp,
Where all night long, by a firefly lamp,
She paddles her white canoe.
And her firefly lamp I soon shall see,
And her paddle I soon shall hear;
Long and moving our life shall be
And I'll hide the maid in a cypress tree,
When the footstep of death is near.'
Away to the Dismal Swamp he speeds, -
His path was rugged and sore,
Through tangled juniper, beds of reeds,
Through many a fen where the serpent feeds,
And man never trod before.
And when on the earth he sank to sleep,
If slumber his eyelids knew,
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poem by Thomas Moore
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