University of Virginia Library


36

ELEGIAC LYRIC.

Written upon the death, at Philadelphia in 1830, of A. H. Corwine, Portrait and Landscape Painter of this city.

“WEEP, FOR THE WORD IS SPOKEN!”

Weep, for the worthy fallen!
Mourn, for the bright and free!
Ambition hath a votary less
Upon the bended knee.
He was of those whose souls are given
To Glory and to Fame—
And he sought to win a wreath from Heaven,
On which to write—A NAME.
His was the depth of feeling
The sons of genius know—
A ray of light caught from above,
To cheer his path below.
He called the beautiful and bright
From nothingness—and gave
A living glory to the night—
A motion to the wave!
And he won unto his easel,
The visions of the blest;
And caught at times a glimpse of where
The sons of genius rest.
He revelled in the sunny light
That gilds the West at even—
And peopled it with forms as bright
As Houri girls of Heaven.
Dust unto dust returneth!
And he hath given up
The glory and the gloom of life,
And drunk the bitter cup.
The meteor-light of intellect
Hath faded from his brow;
His dreams of the IDEAL are wreck'd—
His sleep is dreamless now.