Fincastle Mirror

POETRY.

From the New York American.

The following lines breathe, in simple and beautiful language, the pure tender, and resigned spirit of a poet and a Christian. They are from the pen of the only avowed poet, as far as we can learn, among the Society of Friends:

THE POET'S THANKS.

By Bernard Barton.

Nay! let not sorrow cloud thy brow, nor thus in thought repine,
Because thou seest my vigour bow, my drooping health decline;
This heart is yet in love unchilled, my spirit is as free,
My feelings, still, as fondly thrill, whenever I turn to thee.

I know, although thou speak'st them not, the thoughts which fill thy mind:
Thou think'st thy minstrel's earthly lot unworthily assign'd:
Could wish of thine that lot dictate, much brighter it would be,
Yet far from cheerless is his fate, who finds a friend like thee.

I own I should rejoice to share what poorest peasants do,
To breathe heaven's heart-reviving air and hail its vault of blue;
To see great Nature's soul awake, in flower, bush and tree,
And childhood's early joys partake, in quiet haunt with thee.

Yet more, ah more, 'twould soothe my soul, with thee dear friend to stray.
Where ocean's murmuring billows roll, in some secluded bay;
The silent cliffs, the speaking main, the breezes blowing free,
None could look, speak, breathe in vain, if felt and shared with thee.

Yet though such luxuries as these, remain to us unknown.
We from our scanty store may seize some joys of tenderest tone;
Proudest prosperity had brought no purer bliss to me,
Than bleak Adversity has caught in darkest hour from thee.

Had fortune on our prospects smiled, and sunshine round us flung,
Had flowers alone our path beguiled, where many a thorn has sprung--
That thornless path, those sun-bright skies, though lovely they might be
Could ne'er have aught my heart to prize what most I prize in thee.

The bird whose soft and plaintive song is heard alone at night,
Whose note outvies the warbling throng that hail day's garnished light--
The flower that spreads, in wilds remote, its blossoms to the bee--
These, these the touching charms denote which I discern in thee.

Thy voice in care, in grief, in pain, has been to me as dear
As nature owns the night-bird's strain in watches dark and drear;
What to the bee that flow'ret's bloom, or sun-light to the sea;
All this and more, in hours of gloom, have I oft found in thee.

While some, as every joy decreased, their sympathy denied,
Or like the Levite and the Priest passed on the other side;
My cares thou didst not coldly scan, nor from my sorrows flee;
The kind, the good Samaritan was still a type of thee.

Though I may darkly pass away, as in the noon of life,
And sink, by premature decay, from being's feverish strife:
Yet thou at least, hast been a friend, a noble friend to me,
Nor with thy mortal life can end the tribute due to thee.

Believe it not! the love that gives to life its truest seat,
The warm affection that outlives the sunshine of the breast:
These, these are boons surpassing far what bends the worldling's knee;
These, which the world can never mar, I owe dear friend to thee.

And should some fragments of my song, which thy applause endears,
Borne on the stream of time along, survive to distant years,
May such around thy cherished name a fadeless garland be,
And with the Poet's purest fame, be twined his love for thee.