POETRY.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2573, 6 July 1882, Page 4

POETRY.

LONGFELLOW'S LAST POEM. The following poem appears in the " At- I {antic Monthly" for May, and is the last that Longfellow wrote. Ifc ia stated that the. proofs of it wero revised by the poet only a few days bofore hia last sickness : MAD RIVER, In the White Mountains. tbatbixeb. Why dosb thou wildly rush and roar, Mad River, Oh Mad River f Wilt thou not pause and cease to pour Tby hurrying, headlong waters o'er This rooky shelf for ever ? What secret trouble stirs thy breast ? Why all this fret 3nd flurry ? Dost thou not know that what is best In this too restless world is rest From over-work and worry ? THE BIVtfB. What would'st thou in these mountains seek, O stranger from the city la it perhaps Borno foolish freak Of thine to put the words I speak Into a plaintive ditty P TEAVBLLBE. Yes; I would learn of thoe thy song, With all its flowing numbers, And in a voice as fresh and strong As thine is, sing it all day long, And hear it in my slumbers. THE BIVER. A brooklet nameless and unknown Was I at first, resembling A little child, that all alone Comt-E venturing down the stairs of stone Irresolute and trembling. Later, by wayward fancies led, For tho wide world I panted Out of tho forest dark and dreadAcross the opan fields I fled, Liko one pursued and haunted I tossed my arms, I sang aloud, My voioo exultant blending With thunder from the passing cloud; Tho wind the forest bent and bowed, The rush of rain descending. I heard the distant ocean nil, Imploring and intreating; Drawn onward, o'er this rocky wall I plunged, and the loud waterfall Made answer to the greeting. And now, beset with many ills, A toilsome life I f .How ; Compelled to carry from the hills These logs to the impatient mills Below there in tho hollow* Yet something ever cheers and ohaima The rudeness of my labours ; Daily I water with these arms The cattle of a hundred farms, And havo the birds for neighbours. Man call me mad, and well they may, When, full of rage and trouble, I burst my banks of sand and clajF, And sweep their wooden bridge away Like withered reeds or stubble. Now go and write thy little rhyme, As of thine own creating Thcu secsfc the day is past its prime, I c*n no longer waste my time ; The mills are tired of waiting.