 | Poems |  |
FLORENCE.
I
Beautiful Florence! many a name is sweetIn the world's ear, but thine is very song;
Music and beauty's rarest charm belong
To its dear sound, and in its utterance meet,
And in thine Arno's, that, along each street,
Winds wooingly, fond loitering among
Thy palaces, on which Time's touch no wrong
Will lay, since they are sacred from the feet
That, treading, made them famous evermore.
Oh, that thy cypresses, these eyes might see!
Thy statued walks, these feet might wander o'er!
That to these ears thy fountains' plash might be
Gladness! Oh, thy still goddess to adore,
Thy heaven of beauty lustrous from the sea!
II
Neri, Bianchi, Guelf and Ghibeline,These iron-grated windows of them tell;
These castled mansions of them whisper well,
And of the struggles which these streets have seen,
Fell wrath, and vengeful hate, which here have been,
And subtle brains, which here once tower'd or fell;
Still in these palaces grim shadows dwell,
Whose names for ages on men's tongues have been.
523
There wrought the Medici their good and ill;
Cosmo's grand presence here the eye still awes;
Lorenzo's voice starts from the silence still;
Great were thy tyrants, Florence. Equal laws,
Bless God! now rule thee by thy own great will.
III
Yet lightlier reck we of their strength and power,Than of the greatness here that stamps them great,
Art's radiant glories which illumed their state,
And made them more than puppets of their hour,
Throned things the years create, the years devour;
Hush'd are their schemes and plots, their pride, and hate,
The fear, the love, that on their pomp would wait,
Smile with their smile, or with their frowns would lour;
What reck we of them? But we reverence still,
In each what makes us bow to each great name,
Their love for beauty whose bright glories fill
Their chambers with the forms which are their fame;
For this, nor time, nor change, their names shall kill,
Or dim their memories, or their glories shame.
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