 | Fantasy and Passion |  |
182
ANTIPODES.
I. POE.
He loved all shadowy spots, all seasons drear;
All ways of darkness lured his ghastly whim;
Strange fellowships he held with goblins grim,
At whose demoniac eyes he felt no fear.
On midnights through dense darkness he would peer,
To watch the pale ghoul feed, by tombstones dim.
The appalling forms of phantoms walked with him,
And murder breathed its red guilt in his ear!
All ways of darkness lured his ghastly whim;
Strange fellowships he held with goblins grim,
At whose demoniac eyes he felt no fear.
On midnights through dense darkness he would peer,
To watch the pale ghoul feed, by tombstones dim.
The appalling forms of phantoms walked with him,
And murder breathed its red guilt in his ear!
By desolate paths of dream, where fancy's owl
Sent long lugubrious hoots through sombre air,
Amid thought's gloomiest caves he went to prowl,
And met delirium in her awful lair,
And mingled with cold shapes that writhe or scowl,
Serpents of horror, black bats of despair!
Sent long lugubrious hoots through sombre air,
Amid thought's gloomiest caves he went to prowl,
And met delirium in her awful lair,
And mingled with cold shapes that writhe or scowl,
Serpents of horror, black bats of despair!
183
II. WHITTIER.
Fresh as on breezy seas the ascendant day,
And bright as on thick dew its radiant trace;
Pure as the smile on some babe's dreaming face;
Hopeful as meadows at the breath of May,
One loftiest aim his melodies obey,
Like dawnward larks in roseate deeps of space—
While that large reverent love for all his race
Makes him a man in manhood's lordlier way!
And bright as on thick dew its radiant trace;
Pure as the smile on some babe's dreaming face;
Hopeful as meadows at the breath of May,
One loftiest aim his melodies obey,
Like dawnward larks in roseate deeps of space—
While that large reverent love for all his race
Makes him a man in manhood's lordlier way!
His words like pearls are luminous yet strong;
His duteous thought ennobles while it calms;
We seem to have felt the falling, in his song,
Of benedictions and of sacred balms;
To have seen the aureoled angels group and throng
In heavenly valleylands, by shining palms!
His duteous thought ennobles while it calms;
We seem to have felt the falling, in his song,
Of benedictions and of sacred balms;
To have seen the aureoled angels group and throng
In heavenly valleylands, by shining palms!
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