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Poetry: The Fugitive Slave's Apostrophe To The North Star

Poetry: The Fugitive Slave's Apostrophe To The North Star image
Parent Issue
Day
10
Month
November
Year
1841
Copyright
Public Domain
Additional Text

John Pierpont wrote a companion poem titled "Slaveholder's Address to the North Star." Both were published in Anti-Slavery Poems of John Pierpont, Boston: Oliver Johnson, 1843.

Poem
OCR Text

Star of the North! though night winds drift The fleecy drapery of theeky, Between the lamp and rue, I lift, Yca, lift wit li hope, my sleep less cyo To the bluoheights wherein thou dwellest, And of a laúd of frcedoai tellost. Star of the North! while blazing day Pours round me its full tide of light, And hides thy pale but faithrul ray, I, too, lie hid, and long for iiigbt : For night: I dare not walk at noon, Nor dare I trust the faithless moon - Nor faithless man, whoao burning lust, For gold hath riveted uiy chain, - Nor other leader can I trust But thee, of even the starry train; For all the host around thee burning, Likc faithless man, keep turning, turning. I may not follow whore they go :- Star of the North, I look to thee While on I pressi for weli I know Thy light and truth ehall set me freo; Thy light, that no poor slave deceiveth; Thy truth, that all my soul believoth. They of tho East bghold the star That over Bethlo'ms manger glowed; Withjoy they hailed it fromafar, And followed whore it marked the road, Till where lts rays directly feil, They found the Hope of Israel. Wiae were tho men who followed thus The Star that sets man free from sint Star of the North! thou art to us - Who're sla ves because we wcar a skin Dark ae is Night's protecting wing - Thou art to us a boly thing. And we are wiee to follow thee! I trust tny steady light alone.- Star of the North! thou seem'st to me To burn before the Almighty's throne, To guide me through these forests dim And, vast, to liberly andlIIM. Thy beam is on the glassy breast Of the stil! spring, upon whose brink I lay my weary limbs to reet, And bow my parching Ups to drink. Guide of the friondless negro's way, I bless thee for this quiot ray! In the dark top of southern pines I nestled, when the Driver's hom Called to tho field, in lengthened linee, My fcllows, at the break of mom. And there I lay till thy swectjaco Looked in upon "my hiding place."The" tangled canebrake, where I crepl For shelter from the beat of uoon, And where, while othera toiled, I slept, Till wakened by tho riaing moon, As its stalks folt the night wind free, Gave me to catch aglimpse of thee. Star of the North! in bright array Tho constellationa round thee svecp, Each holding on its nightly vray, Hiöing, or stnking in tho deep, And, as it hangs in mid hoaven ñaming, The homago of some natioi ciaiming. This nation to the Eagle cowers; Fit easign! she's a bird ofapoil: Like worahips like.' for eachdevours Theearninga of another's toil. I've folt her talons and her beak, And now the gentier Lion eeek. The Ldon,# at the Virgin's foet Crouchoa, and laye his paw Into her lap! - an emblem meet Of England'a queen; and English law; Qüoen that hath made her Islands freo! Law, that holda out its shield to me! Star of the North! upon that ehield Thou shineit,-- O, for ever shme! The negro, from the cotton field Shall, then, beneatbits orb recline, And feed the Lion, couched before it, Nor head the Eagle, screaming o'er it! Tbe Constellations Aquila, Leo, and Virgo, are here rneant by the aetronomical Fugitive.