 | My Mind and its Thoughts, in Sketches, Fragments, and Essays |  |
Not theirs the altar's consecrated flame,
Which soars to Heaven in honor, peace and fame,
Whose chasten'd light is seen on earth to glow,
Like moon-beams o'er a sculptur'd angels brow;
But theirs a meteor-plague which threatning shone,
Till every fluttering wing of fear had flown;
A meteor-plague, whose inauspicious ray
Bore all the blooming health of hope away.
[OMITTED]
That blessing which the dream of passion sought,
Waked to the frantic extasy of thought.
Opposed—in life with fated fondness grew,
Opposed—in dust no mingling union knew.
And thence, in ever parted tombs they lie,
Martyrs of morbid love's insanity.
Love, the betrayer! near whose breath of fire,
The calm affections tremble—or retire—
So in the Land of Ice, mid stainless snows,
His boiling strength the dangerous Geyser
show
Powerful in mischief—bold in beauty soars
From shuddering earth, to heaven's receding towers.
Pervading all; but not in all the same,
Here pale with frost, there blushing red with flame.
Which soars to Heaven in honor, peace and fame,
Whose chasten'd light is seen on earth to glow,
Like moon-beams o'er a sculptur'd angels brow;
But theirs a meteor-plague which threatning shone,
Till every fluttering wing of fear had flown;
A meteor-plague, whose inauspicious ray
Bore all the blooming health of hope away.
[OMITTED]
That blessing which the dream of passion sought,
Waked to the frantic extasy of thought.
Opposed—in life with fated fondness grew,
Opposed—in dust no mingling union knew.
And thence, in ever parted tombs they lie,
Martyrs of morbid love's insanity.
Love, the betrayer! near whose breath of fire,
The calm affections tremble—or retire—
So in the Land of Ice, mid stainless snows,
His boiling strength the dangerous Geyser
The Great Geyser, or Boiling Fountain of Iceland, ejects a stream of boiling water, sometimes more than a hundred feet upward, wrapped in foam—and encircled by beautiful rainbows, burying itself beneath the rock, and ascending the skies in constant alternation—the effect of subterranean fires sometimes giving the appearance of deep red or green to parts of the Geyser.—See Sir G. S. Mackenzie. Also, I think; Dr. Henderson, the last Traveller who has published Observations on the Great Geyser.
Powerful in mischief—bold in beauty soars
From shuddering earth, to heaven's receding towers.
Pervading all; but not in all the same,
Here pale with frost, there blushing red with flame.
| My Mind and its Thoughts, in Sketches, Fragments, and Essays | |