Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By Dora ReadGoodale

1593 The Flight of the Heart

THE HEART soars up like a bird

From a nest of care;

Up, up to a larger sky,

To a softer air.

No eye can measure its flight

And no hand can tame;

It mounts in beauty and light,

In music and flame.

Of all the changes of Time

There is none like this;

The heart soars up like a bird

At the stroke of bliss.

The heart soars up like a bird,

But its wings soon tire;

Enough of rapture and song,

The cloud and the fire!

Its look, the look of a king—

Of a slave, its birth,

The poor, tired, impotent thing

Sinks back to the earth.

And the mother spreads her lap,

And she lulls its pain:

“Oh, thou who sighed for the sun,

Art thou mine again?”