And Otway, Radcliffe, Schiller, Shakspeare's art Had stamp'd her image in me, and even so, Although I found her thus, we did not part, Perchance even dearer in her day of woe, Than when she was a boast, a marvel and a show. I can repeople with the past-and of The present there is still for eye and thought, And more, it may be, than I hoped or sought; And of the happiest moments which were wrought From thee, fair Venice! have their colours caught: Nor torture shake, or mine would now be cold and dumb But from their nature will the tannen grow Of eddying storms; yet springs the trunk and mocks And grew a giant tree;--the mind may grow the same Existence may be borne, and the deep root All suffering doth destroy, or is destroy'd, Even by the sufferer; and, in each event, Ends. Some, with hope replenish'd and rebuoy'd, Return to whence they came--with like intent, And weave their web again; some, bow'd and ben Wax gray and ghastly, withering ere their time, And perish with the reed on which they leant: Some seek devotion, toil, war, good or crime, According as their souls were form'd to sink or climb. But ever and anon of griefs subdued There comes a token like a scorpion's sting, And slight withal may be the things which bring Back on the heart the weight which it would fling A tone of music,-summer's eve-or spring, A flower-the wind-the Ocean-which shall wound, Striking the electric chain where with we are darkly bound; And how and why we know not, nor can trace The spectres whom no exorcism can bind, The cold-the changed-perchance the dead-anew, The mourn'd, the loved, the lost-too many!—yet how few! But my soul wanders; I demand it back A ruin amidst ruins; there to track Fall'n states and buried greatness, o'er a land The master-mould of Nature's heavenly hand, The commonwealth of kings, the men of Rome! The moon is up, and yet it is not night- A single star is at her side, and reigns As Day and night contending were, until The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil Which streams upon her stream, and glass'd within it glows, Fill'd with the face of heaven, which, from afar Comes down upon the waters: all its hues, Their magical variety diffuse: And now they change; a paler shadow strews Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues The last still loveliest, till-'tis gone, and all is gray. ROME. OH Rome! my country! city of the soul! Come and see A world is at our feet as fragile as our clay. The Niobe of nations! there she stands, Of their heroic dwellers: dost thou flow, Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle her distress. The Goth, the Christian, Time, War, Flood, and Fire, And up the steep barbarian monarchs ride, Where the car climb'd the capitol; far and wide Chaos of ruins! who shall trace the void, O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar light, And say, "here was, or is," where all is doubly night? THE OCEAN. THERE is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: I love not Man the less, but Nature more, From these our interviews, in which I steal From all I may be, or have been before, To mingle with the Universe, and feel, What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal. Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean-roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; Man marks the earth with ruin-his control Stops with the shore;-upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, When, for a moment, like a drop of rain, He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown, The armaments which thunderstrike the walls These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee. Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they! Thy waters wasted them while they were free, And many a tyrant since; their shores obey The stranger, slave, or savage; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts:-not so thou, Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure browSuch as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now. Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Calm or convuls'd-in breeze, or gale, or storm, Dark heaving;-boundless, endless, and sublime- Of the invisible; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone. GREECE. No breath of air to break the wave That rolls below the Athenian's grave, That tomb which, gleaming o'er the cliff, First greets the homeward-veering skiff, High o'er the land he saved in vain: When shall such hero live again? Fair clime! where every season smiles The maid for whom his melody, Rush the night-prowlers on the prey And turn to groans his roundelay. Strange that where Nature loved to trace, As if for Gods, a dwelling place, |