Poems of Henry Timrod [11]
dead, and has hallowed these sacred mounds to his people in the words, -- "There is no holier spot of ground Than where defeated valor lies, By mourning beauty crowned!"
These poems are written in the life-blood of the poet and his generation. The patriotic fire, the devoted sacrifice and splendid achievement, that "Carolina", "Cry to Arms", "Unknown Dead", "Carmen Triumphale", "Charleston", "Storm and Calm", and the other of the war poems celebrate were not only the rushing tide of earnest feeling of a noble people then, but are now a part of the glory and heritage of the State, of the South, and of the American republic. They were the mighty heart-beats of that great epoch. They are now irrevocable history, and make these poems a part of the abiding literature of America.
"A Common Thought" is the poet's premonition of his end; but he sees no vision of the dying glory of sunset, no going out into the dark, no presentiment of a vague and gloomy voyage on a homeless sea; but in the sunshine, in the growing light of ever broadening day, amid the joy and splendor of nature, bright prophecy and intuition of immortality, is to come the sudden, solemn mystery of the whisper, "He is gone!" And so it was. For as the sun broadened into glad day, and the full radiance illumined and animated earth and sea and sky, "as it purpled in the zenith, as it brightened on the lawn," this rich young life, in its own fresh morning of genius and spiritual sunshine, passed, and in his own triumphant words, -- "not dies, no more than Spirit dies; But in a change like death was clothed with wings."
The Late Judge George S. Bryan
It would not be fitting that this memorial edition of Timrod's Poems should go forth to the world without proper recognition, on the part of the TIMROD MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION, of the relation occupied and the services rendered to the poet in his lifetime by the late Hon. George S. Bryan, of Charleston. During the whole of Timrod's career Judge Bryan was his devoted friend, ever ready to assist him materially, morally, and in every other respect.
His faith in Timrod's genius never wavered, and but for his early assistance, sympathy, and encouragement, much of the fruit of that genius would have been lost or wasted. He helped him in adversity, cheered him in his hours of anxiety and despondency, and from first to last, throughout the literary and spiritual history of the poet, he did more than any other friend to keep alive in his heart the steadfast flame of faith in his poetic destiny; Judge Bryan's name must always be inseparably connected with Henry Timrod's in the literary annals of South Carolina.
January, 1899.
--------------------- Poems of Henry Timrod ---------------------
Spring
Spring, with that nameless pathos in the air Which dwells with all things fair, Spring, with her golden suns and silver rain, Is with us once again.
Out in the lonely woods the jasmine burns Its fragrant lamps, and turns Into a royal court with green festoons The banks of dark lagoons.
In the deep heart of every forest tree The blood is all aglee, And there's a look about the leafless bowers As if they dreamed of flowers.
Yet still on every side we trace the hand Of Winter in the land, Save where the maple reddens on the lawn, Flushed by the season's dawn;
Or where, like those strange semblances we find That age to childhood bind, The elm puts on, as if in Nature's scorn, The brown of Autumn corn.
As yet the turf is dark, although you know That, not a span below, A thousand germs are groping through the gloom, And soon will burst their tomb.
Already, here and there, on frailest stems Appear some azure gems, Small as might deck, upon a gala day, The forehead of a fay.
In gardens you may note amid the dearth The crocus breaking earth; And near the snowdrop's tender white and green, The violet in its screen.
But many gleams and shadows need must pass Along the budding grass, And weeks go by, before the enamored South
These poems are written in the life-blood of the poet and his generation. The patriotic fire, the devoted sacrifice and splendid achievement, that "Carolina", "Cry to Arms", "Unknown Dead", "Carmen Triumphale", "Charleston", "Storm and Calm", and the other of the war poems celebrate were not only the rushing tide of earnest feeling of a noble people then, but are now a part of the glory and heritage of the State, of the South, and of the American republic. They were the mighty heart-beats of that great epoch. They are now irrevocable history, and make these poems a part of the abiding literature of America.
"A Common Thought" is the poet's premonition of his end; but he sees no vision of the dying glory of sunset, no going out into the dark, no presentiment of a vague and gloomy voyage on a homeless sea; but in the sunshine, in the growing light of ever broadening day, amid the joy and splendor of nature, bright prophecy and intuition of immortality, is to come the sudden, solemn mystery of the whisper, "He is gone!" And so it was. For as the sun broadened into glad day, and the full radiance illumined and animated earth and sea and sky, "as it purpled in the zenith, as it brightened on the lawn," this rich young life, in its own fresh morning of genius and spiritual sunshine, passed, and in his own triumphant words, -- "not dies, no more than Spirit dies; But in a change like death was clothed with wings."
The Late Judge George S. Bryan
It would not be fitting that this memorial edition of Timrod's Poems should go forth to the world without proper recognition, on the part of the TIMROD MEMORIAL ASSOCIATION, of the relation occupied and the services rendered to the poet in his lifetime by the late Hon. George S. Bryan, of Charleston. During the whole of Timrod's career Judge Bryan was his devoted friend, ever ready to assist him materially, morally, and in every other respect.
His faith in Timrod's genius never wavered, and but for his early assistance, sympathy, and encouragement, much of the fruit of that genius would have been lost or wasted. He helped him in adversity, cheered him in his hours of anxiety and despondency, and from first to last, throughout the literary and spiritual history of the poet, he did more than any other friend to keep alive in his heart the steadfast flame of faith in his poetic destiny; Judge Bryan's name must always be inseparably connected with Henry Timrod's in the literary annals of South Carolina.
January, 1899.
--------------------- Poems of Henry Timrod ---------------------
Spring
Spring, with that nameless pathos in the air Which dwells with all things fair, Spring, with her golden suns and silver rain, Is with us once again.
Out in the lonely woods the jasmine burns Its fragrant lamps, and turns Into a royal court with green festoons The banks of dark lagoons.
In the deep heart of every forest tree The blood is all aglee, And there's a look about the leafless bowers As if they dreamed of flowers.
Yet still on every side we trace the hand Of Winter in the land, Save where the maple reddens on the lawn, Flushed by the season's dawn;
Or where, like those strange semblances we find That age to childhood bind, The elm puts on, as if in Nature's scorn, The brown of Autumn corn.
As yet the turf is dark, although you know That, not a span below, A thousand germs are groping through the gloom, And soon will burst their tomb.
Already, here and there, on frailest stems Appear some azure gems, Small as might deck, upon a gala day, The forehead of a fay.
In gardens you may note amid the dearth The crocus breaking earth; And near the snowdrop's tender white and green, The violet in its screen.
But many gleams and shadows need must pass Along the budding grass, And weeks go by, before the enamored South