SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS! SUN OF THE SLEEPLESS! melancholy star! So gleams the past, the light of other days, A night-beam Sorrow watcheth to behold, Distinct, but distant-clear-but, oh how cold! WERE MY BOSOM AS FALSE AS THOU DEEM'ST IT TO BE. I. WERE MY BOSOM AS FALSE AS THOU DEEM'ST IT TO BE, I need not have wandered from far Galilee; It was but abjuring my creed to efface The curse which, thou say'st, is the crime of my race. II. If the bad never triumph, then God is with thee! If the slave only sin, thou art spotless and free! If the Exile on earth is an Outcast on high, Live on in thy faith, but in mine I will die. III. I have lost for that faith more than thou canst bestow, As the God who permits thee to prosper doth know; In his hand is my heart and my hope-and in thine The land and the life which for him I resign. HEROD'S LAMENT FOR MARIAMNE. I. OH, Mariamne! now for thee The heart for which thou bled'st is bleeding; Revenge is lost in agony, And wild remorse to rage succeeding. Oh, Mariamne! where art thou? Thou canst not hear my bitter pleading: Ah, could'st thou-thou would'st pardon now, Though heaven were to my prayer unheeding. II. And is she dead?—and did they dare Obey my phrensy's jealous raving? My wrath but doom'd my own despair: The sword that smote her's o'er me waving.— But thou art cold, my murdered love! And this dark heart is vainly craving For her who soars alone above, And leaves my soul unworthy saving. VOL. IV. |