 | Poems |  |
II.
[Here is the life of Rome. The air of death]
Here is the life of Rome. The air of death,Silence and solitude and awe are here;
Spectres of grandeur, at whose bygone breath
Earth still'd and trembled, from these leaves appear;
From these weird words steal wonder and strange fear,
An awful past, which he who listeneth
In solemn awe, with trembling heart may hear,
Hearing what from her stones the Bygone saith.
Here is the double life that haunts Rome's hills,
Power spelt in ruins—art that wreathes all time,
Beauty eternal which the rapt air fills
With reverence from fit souls from every clime.
Hawthorne, henceforth, here, with life's joys and ills,
Rome's thoughts are with me, and her dreams sublime.
| Poems | |