James Grahame
James Grahame Poems
Dear to my soul! ah, early lost!
Affection's arm was weak to save:
Now friendship's pride, and virtue's boast,
Have come to an untimely grave!
...
How still the morning of the hallow'd day!
Mute is the voice of rural labour, hush'd
The ploughboy's whistle, and the milkmaid's song.
...
Six days the heavenly host, in circle vast,
Like that untouching cincture which enzones
The globe of Saturn, compass'd wide this orb,
...
How dazzling white the snowy scene! deep, deep,
The stillness of the winter Sabbath day, -
Not even a foot-fall heard. - Smooth are the fields,
...
When homeward bands their several ways disperse,
I love to linger in the narrow field
Of rest, to wander round from tomb to tomb,
...
Blind, poor, and helpless Bartimeus sat,
Listening the foot of the wayfaring man,
Still hoping that the next, and still the next,
...
Who
is my mother, or my brethren?
He spake, and look'd on them who sat around,
...
The long-piled mountain-snows at last dissolve,
Bursting the roaring river's brittle bonds.
Ponderous the fragments down the cataract shoot,
...
While wind and rain drive through the half-stripped trees,
Fanners and flails go merrily in the barn.
...
Through boughs still leafless, or through foliage thin,
The sloping primrose-bed lies fair exposed,
...
Intense the viewless flood of heat descends
On hill, and dale, and wood, and tangled brake,
Where, to the chirping grasshopper, the broom,
...
No more at dewy dawn, or setting sun,
The blackbird's song floats mellow down the dale;
...
Raised by the coming plough, the merry lark
Upsprings, and, soaring, joins the high-poised choirs
That carol far and near, in spiral flight
...
Sweet month! thy locks with bursting buds begemmed,
With opening hyacinths and hawthorn flowers,
...
Fair shines the sun, but with a meekened smile
Regretful, on the variegated woods
And glittering streams, where floats the hazel spray,
...
Sore was the famine throughout all the bounds
Of Israel, when Elijah, by command
Of God, journeyed to Cherith's failing brook.
...
Winter was o'er, and spring flowers deck'd the glade;
The Blackbird's note among the wild woods rung;
...
Pharaoh upon a gorgeous throne of state
Was seated; while around him stood submiss
His servants, watchful of his lofty looks.
...
From conquest Jephtha came, with faltering step
And troubled eye: His home appears in view;
He trembles at the sight. Sad he forbodes, -
...
Yon motley, sable-suited throng, that wait
Around the poor man's door, announce a tale
Of wo; the husband, parent, is no more.
...
James Grahame Biography
James Grahame (April 22, 1765 – September 14, 1811) was a Scottish poet. He was born in Glasgow, the son of a successful lawyer. After completing his literary course at the University of Glasgow, Grahame went in 1784 to Edinburgh, where he worked as a legal clerk, and was called to the Scottish bar in 1795. However, he had always wanted to go in for the Church, and when he was forty-four he took Anglican orders, and became a curate first at Shipton, Gloucestershire, and then at Sedgefield, Durham. His works include a dramatic poem, Mary Queen of Scots (1801), The Sabbath (1804), British Georgics (1804), The Birds of Scotland (1806), and Poems on the Abolition of the Slave Trade (1810). His principal work, The Sabbath, a sacred and descriptive poem in blank verse, is characterized by devotional feeling and by happy delineation of Scottish scenery. In the notes to his poems he expresses enlightened views on popular education, the criminal law and other public questions. He was emphatically a friend of humanity--a philanthropist as well as a poet.)
The Best Poem Of James Grahame
On The Death Of A Sister
Dear to my soul! ah, early lost!
Affection's arm was weak to save:
Now friendship's pride, and virtue's boast,
Have come to an untimely grave!
Closed, ever closed, those speaking eyes,
Where sweetness beam'd, where candour shone;
And silent that heart-thrilling voice,
Which music loved, and call'd her own.
That gentle bosom now is cold,
Where feeling's vestal splendours glow'd;
And crumbling down to common mould,
That heart where love and truth abode.
Yet I behold the smile unfeign'd,
Which doubt dispell'd and kindness won;
Yet the soft diffidence, that gain'd
The triumph it appear'd to shun.
Delusion all - forbear, my heart;
These unavailing throbs restrain,
Destruction has perform'd his part,
And Death proclaim'd - thy pangs are vain.
Vain though they be, this heart must swell
With grief that time shall ne'er efface;
And still with bitter pleasure dwell
On ev'ry virtue, ev'ry grace.
For ever lost - I vainly dream'd
That Heaven my early friend would spare;
And, darker as the prospect seem'd,
The more I struggled with despair.
I said - yet a presaging tear
Unbidden rose, and spoke more true -
'She still shall live - th' unfolding year
Shall banish care, and health renew.
'She yet shall tread the flow'ry field,
And catch the opening rose's breath:
To watchful love disease shall yield,
And friendship ward the shaft of death.'
'Alas! before the violet bloom'd -
Before the snows of winter fled;
Too certain fate my hopes consumed,
For she was number'd with the dead.
She died - deserving to be mourn'd,
While parted worth a pang can give.
She died - by Heaven's best gifts adorn'd,
While folly, falsehood, baseness, live.
Long in their aseness live secure
The noxious weed and wounding thorn,
While, snatch'd by violence, ere mature,
The lily from her stem is torn.
Yet who shall blame the heart that feels
When Heaven resumes the good it gave?
Yet who shall scorn the tear that falls
From friendship's eye at virtue's grave?
Friend, parent, sister - tenderest names!
May I, as pale at mem'ry's shrine
Ye pour the tribute anguish claims,
Approach unblamed, and mingle mine.
Long on the joys of vanish'd years
The glance of sadness shall ye cast;
Long, long th' emphatic speech of tears
Shall mourn thy bloom for ever past.
And thou, who from the orient day
Return'st with hope's gay dreams elate,
Falsely secure and vainly gay,
Unconscious of the stroke of fate.
What waits thee? not th' approving smile
Of faithful love that chases care;
Not the fond glance o'er paying toil,
But cold and comfortless despair.
Despair! - I see the phantom rove
On Cail's green banks, no longer bright,
And fiercely grasp the torch of love,
And plunge it in sepulchral night.
Farewell, sweet maiden; at thy tomb
My silent footstep oft shall stray;
More dear to me its hallow'd gloom,
Than life's broad glare, and fortune's day.
And oft, as fancy paints thy bier,
And mournful eyes thy lowly bed,
The secret sigh shall rise - the tear
That shuns observance shall be shed.
Nor shall the thoughts of thee depart,
Nor shall my soul regret resign,
Till mem'ry perish, till this heart
Be cold and motionless as thine.
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4/25/2024 7:36:35 AM # 1.0.0.1119
James Grahame's works are very nice and heart touching as he has written many poems from his true perception. His every poem is a gem. I am astonished reading his highly expressed and skilled poems. May God ever bring peace for him.