Thou art gone, but oh! in that land of peace Where sin, and sorrow and anguish cease, Where all is happy and bright and fair, My own sweet love, may I meet thee there? MARCH, 1857. JUBAL. (Book of Genesis iv. 21.) The Sun soon kissed to flowers, the blood-stained sod, From which the voice of Abel cried to God, And drove his murderer to the land of Nod; And smiling, kindly watched them day by day, Till they, like Abel, died and passed away, And other flowers grew bright above their clay. While with impartial kindness, year by year, He kissed from Cain’s curs’d face the awful tear That flowed when that dread voice appalled his ear. Still as at night the silent woods are stirred By the lone calling of some mateless bird, Ever that voice in Cain’s sad heart was heard. But busy hands for good or bad are best To still the aching voices of the breast, And load the body with the soul’s unrest. So, tow’rds the Sun the City Enoch rose, Beneath Cain’s hands, as in the desert grows A palm whose shade the tawny outcast knows. The City Enoch! from the first-born named Of the first-born of woman, son of blood! Built long ere Babel’s boastful tower was shamed, Earth’s lonely capital before the flood! The City Enoch! here were sown and grew The seeds of Art when Art and life were long; Here Lamech turned his misery to song, Hence Jabal journeyed, seeking pastures new! Here man’s soft hand made brass and iron yield To cunning shapes and uses,--wondrous skill! Tearing earth’s iron heart with iron will, To see what secrets in it lay concealed! And here, O music, like a dream of heaven, Thy subtle thrills did touch the wearied brain, With raptured, passionate longing to regain The bliss of having naught to be forgiven! Let me in fancy see thee rise again O city of the Wanderer, seldom sought! City of that wise Jubal who first taught The harp and organ to the sons of men! That I may learn the secret of his might, Who, leaving earth unto his brother’s care, Did gentle battle with the powers of air, And made them his and ours by victor’s right! Adah, the first-beloved of Lamech’s wives, Bare him two sons. Jabal, the eldest-born, Grew up to manhood, strong and bold and free; And leaving Enoch, sought a boundless home, Living in tents, a king amid his flocks, Setting his throne where’er his subjects thrived, Lord, or allowed vicegerent under God, Unto the “cattle on a thousand hills.” But Jubal, wise and gentle, ’tis for thee That we would raise to life the giant shades That lived and loved, and sinned and wept and died Ere Heaven’s great tears had washed away the crime That stained the beauty of the early earth; And Enoch, mistress of primeval Art, Lay, the dead mistress of a drownèd world.