C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
To My Lamp
By Alphonse de Lamartine (1790–1869)
H
Dear witness once of dearer loves of mine!
My happiness is fled,—thy store of oil
Still with clear light doth shine!
When in Pompeii’s streets I roamed along,
Evoking memories of her brilliant strife,
Half tearful, half in song.
I was alone among a buried host;
And in the dust my idle glances found
The name of some poor ghost.
And near thee, almost buried with the rest,
The impress left there by some lovely child,
The outline of a breast.
To pray within the fane, now desolate,
For happiness that she should never know,—
Love, ne’er to be her fate!
Youth, maiden modesty, the dawning love
A mother’s tender glance could scarce surprise,
Fled to the heavens above!
As one wave by another swiftly borne;
Or as the last hope of some wretch’s dream,
When he awakes at morn!
I was a fool before her feet to lie,
Forgetting that, a stranger like the rest,
She too must fade and die.
My soul would seek the worship that is sure!
It needs a god to triumph, be cast down,
And, after all, endure!
From all that perishes and is forgot;
And I would seek, to start my altar fires,
A hope that dieth not!
Though ’neath his mighty wing he hides his head,
He sees his prey, he strikes it, takes his fill,—
Perchance you thought him dead?
Child of the lyre, born but to touch the string,
Would die inglorious,—yield the golden round,
Live like a banished king.
The gifts once prized, and cherished still the same.
My dreams shall summon back the enchantress pure,
And whisper her dear name.
And when, dear lamp, shall come that mournful night,
When weeping friends behold me fading fast,
Thy flame shall burn more bright!
The sacred emblem of our transient breath,
Mysterious power, to man’s dull uses brought,
Sister of life and death!
It blots in one brief day a city’s name;
Like fate ignored, or held a peerless prize
Like beauty or like fame.
A spirit from on high, to earth no friend;
It takes its flight as human souls aspire,
To seek the unknown end!
’Tis but a sleep, the so-called death of men:
The fly shall have its day, the flower its dawn;
Our clay shall wake again.
The sounds of night that on the horizon fail,
The passing cloud that lays the flowers low,
The will-o’-the-wisp of the vale?
The cradle whence the tomb has snatched its prey?
What is the mystery of grief, or love,
Or night that follows day?
Is not the leaf a book we cannot read?
The stream that brings us harvest or a flood,
Has not it too its screed?
Till all that we should see, life’s end shall show:
Better know naught than into mysteries gaze!
Better believe than know!
While I believe and hope, watch thou o’er me!
If ever prideful doubt my soul should claim,
May I go out with thee!