David Given Schwarm

       Midst others of less note, came one frail Form,       A phantom among men; companionless       As the last cloud of an expiring storm       Whose thunder is its knell; he, as I guess,       Had gaz’d on Nature’s naked loveliness,       Actaeon-like, and now he fled astray       With feeble steps o’er the world’s wilderness,       And his own thoughts,…

       Thus ceas’d she: and the mountain shepherds came,       Their garlands sere, their magic mantles rent;       The Pilgrim of Eternity, whose fame       Over his living head like Heaven is bent,       An early but enduring monument,       Came, veiling all the lightnings of his song       In sorrow; from her wilds Ierne sent       The sweetest lyrist of her…

       “The sun comes forth, and many reptiles spawn;       He sets, and each ephemeral insect then       Is gather’d into death without a dawn,       And the immortal stars awake again;       So is it in the world of living men:       A godlike mind soars forth, in its delight       Making earth bare and veiling heaven, and when       It…

       “The herded wolves, bold only to pursue;       The obscene ravens, clamorous o’er the dead;       The vultures to the conqueror’s banner true       Who feed where Desolation first has fed,       And whose wings rain contagion; how they fled,       When, like Apollo, from his golden bow       The Pythian of the age one arrow sped       And smil’d! The…

       “O gentle child, beautiful as thou wert,       Why didst thou leave the trodden paths of men       Too soon, and with weak hands though mighty heart       Dare the unpastur’d dragon in his den?       Defenceless as thou wert, oh, where was then       Wisdom the mirror’d shield, or scorn the spear?       Or hadst thou waited the full…

       “Stay yet awhile! speak to me once again;       Kiss me, so long but as a kiss may live;       And in my heartless breast and burning brain       That word, that kiss, shall all thoughts else survive,       With food of saddest memory kept alive,       Now thou art dead, as if it were a part       Of thee,…

Plan for the future because that’s where you are going to spend the rest of your life.