Poems :: :: University of Virginia Library

I stood on Zion; and methought (a dream
Of ingulphed ages o'er me came) there stood
An hoary minstrel by me, and the gleam
Of his unwonted flashing eye, imbued
With fire, that long had slept in solitude,
Illumed his furrowed visage, and arrayed
His form in splendour—wayward was his mood
Of feverish being, and a fitful shade
Of unknown anguish passed—but on his vitals prey'd.

118

He stood before me with his caftan rent,
And silvery beard far streaming to the breeze,
His unstrung lyre was tuneless—and he bent
O'er its sad, worn golden wires, like the freize
Of some lone fane o'er tomb-stones, or the greeze,
Where countless votaries thronged, that far winds
Its untrod pathway round the dome, where trees,
Time's moaning relics, sigh, and fate unbinds
The virgin lyrist from her shrine, where worshipped noble minds

An unknown Being sketched in mortal garb;
Around the untombed minstrel myst'ry flung
Her sable mantle—but the thoughts unbarb
The heart, that slumbers in its cell, and, stung
To noble plenitude, like bright stars hung
In yon aerial concave, the soul
Springs to impart its fire; when mind is wrung
To frenzied madness, spurning time's control,
The flood of passion pours, clandestine scenes unroll.

He woke from his deep, unbroken reverie—
Not war's fierce, untamed, courser bounds away
'Mid vollied thunders with triumphal glee,
And shakes the gory battle-field—not the fray
Of ocean's billowy waves, when murky day
Retires, and sheds not light upon the scene
Of the wreck'd bark's despair—as the gray
Genius of time, when burst his voice, I ween,
Seem half so terrible, for their armory's seen.

119

He broke mute silence, and his arched brow
Seemed clothed in jewels, and his tow'ring frame
Of adamant,—and fires irradiate glow,
In one full halo of unearthly flame,
Around him; and his eye's wild wrath to tame
No mortal power would dare. The vision flew
Through boundless space, when pealed his awful name,
And rising empires my fixed optics drew,
While tuned the bard his lyre, and sung how nations grew.

“Prostrate Judea! darling child of heaven!
God was thy hierarch, and gracious King,
Before his war-car hostile hordes were driven,
And in Moriah did warbling music fling
On high melodious praise—choirs, enamoured, wing
Their terrene flight to mingle glory's lays
With adoration's songs—earth, elysium ring,
And votive shrines waft censers' perfume—praise,
Honour and devotion crowned blest Ælia's holy days.

“But low-born chicane, and intrigue beguile
A nation of its grandeur, and infest
Ambition's dome, and wisdom's hall, and smile
Upon the railing turmoil—dregs congest,

120

And poison oft the banquet of the blest;
The vulgar heart enshrouds the hottest fires,
The unknown start, and lords pursue the jest,
Freedom and truth outvie the mob's desires,
But lawless rapine lights the noblest nation's pyres.

“Lo! mailed avengers on the ingrate rush,
In madness fly the ungorged eagles o'er
The heaven-doomed clime, and their broad pinions brush
Away the pride of ages, and the shore,
Where angels love to linger, peals the roar
Of ruin, and the poltroon's cry awakes
The fierce fanatic's vaunt—and on high soar
The proud fane's fragments, where the streaming flakes
Of flame illume the sky, and heaven's bright mirror breaks.

“Debasement drove them to the feats of hell,
And nature shuddered at her children's fall,
Frenzied despair, and frantic fury swell
Alecto's blood-fed orgies—but the pall
Of blackness shrouds the unholy festival;
Rebels they were, alas! they loved the slime
Of the foul quagmire, and the sordid thrall
Of luxury and lust, above the clime,
The Eden portioned—planted—blessed by a kind King sublime.

121

“Lone Desolation stalks through mirthless streets,
And reigns sole monarch of the desert land,
Where God once deigned to sway,—the Sovereign greets
From glory's high arch, where, amid his band
Of bitterns, waves the sceptre of command,
And gleams the jewelled diadem of sate,
His voiceless realm exulting—his stern hand
Upholds his silent mandate—and the state
Of once bright Palestine nought but heaven can renovate.

“Where are thy glories, lost Judea! where?
Where are the pomp and splendour of thy fane?
Aerial strains float not through listless air,
Nor beauties linger on thy ravished plain.
Where are thy high-soul'd heroes? Can again
The voice of dauntless chivalry awake
The dormant energies of David's reign?
Can glory's heaven-descended, full beams break
The spell of bondage, gild the Gallilean lake?

“Behold! yon cloud, that veils the eastern skies,
Secrets the angel of exhaustless love,
It gathers not, but bright transparencies
Reveal where harbingers of mercy move;
Doth not thy soul dilate, when from above
Descends the herald to invoke the bloom,
And rays of heaven upon the clime, where grove,
Hill, dale, stream, rock, and nameless tomb,
Attract love, awe, and veneration, though in gloom?

122

“O towery Babylon! cinctured bright
With massive bulwarks—where the gilded groves
Of spires and turrets shed the solar light,
When eve in darkness reigned—thy splendour proves
A fairy pageant—and the wand'rer roves
Through blood-paved palaces; the dragon loves
To slumber in the monarch's couch—and mirth
And maudlin revel quake, when ireful moves
The fiery besom o'er the startled earth—
And heaven's dire fiat caused Chaldea's dismal dearth.

“She fell by pampered luxury—the hall
Of Semiramis and Belshazzar gleamed
With diverse instruments—at glory's call
The one her courser sped where loudly screamed
The raven o'er red heaps of foes—where beamed
The trophied car of triumph—where the dome
Of fame immortal tow'red—and honour deemed
He built earth's empire; fiery spirits roam,
And make the tombless battle-field their foemen's home.

“The other reigned amid a wilderness
Of dazzling glory, and his gem-crowned brow
Beamed peerless mirth—white robed panders bless
The glorious feast—architraves throw

123

Lamps' kindling light—and the full banquet's glow
Of golden cups, and embossed lavers, crowns
The festive dome—arch'd vaults, and swung globes strow
Delicious incense round—but darkly frowns
Impending vengeance, lo! wreathed flame the palace bounds.

“The voiceless, viewless angel hovered o'er
The festal city—flower-wreathed maidens dance
Around the festooned fane of Bel—the shore
Of grand Euphrates hears the proud steed prance
Along towered walls—afar the Persian's lance
Mocks the bright sunbeams, and the clarion's bray
Echoes a fierce defiance; but the glance
Of the determined captain lights the fray,
And nought can crush the band where all their lord obey.

“Now, save the storm-lash'd pyramid, where sleep
Creation's lords in aweless grandeur, all
The gemm'd land is one vast Golgotha—deep
Lie time's vaunting demigods, to the call
Of honour, or of fame unknown—the pall
Of desolation shrouds them—saint and sage,
Monarch and slave, in foul corruption's thrall
Are held mute compeers, and the guileless page
Of refluent Time doth class them equals of the age.

124

“The feudal manacles no longer bind
The low-born vassal—through the slime and gore
Of war and bondage, slaves no longer wind
Their way, and drag their chains, for the rich store
Of death is mingled clay—and vipers soar
Above distinction; chainless mind obeys
Not the tiar'd despot—nervous powers pour
Tinselled treasures into tyrants' cells—rays
Of thought celestial break debasement's tainting haze.

“Immortal Greece! the dim gem glory leaves,
When on her eagle-pinions, ere the ire
Of freedom's foe the fane of grandeur cleaves,
She seeks the lone wild, where the vestal fire
Of virtue burns—unshackled souls aspire!
The quenchless embers of thy funeral pyre
The despot's fell breath blew to vivid flame:
Though long the willow wore thy warbling lyre,
It lives—and cannot die—thy free-born name,—
And every age shall add a jewel to thy fame.

“Thine was the bard, whose noble ardour lives
In freedom's child, and fires his glowing eye,
Thine the proud sophist, whose great name survives
Conception's crude ideas of mystery;

125

Thine were the heroes, on whom destiny
Attended, like the lightning on the storm;
Thine is the clime, where patriot souls will fly
In freedom's holy cause sublimely warm,
And tread thy hallowed strand, and frown at despot's form.

“Destruction waved his besom o'er thee, Rome
Through pillared streets, and festooned fanes of pride,
The vaulted palace, and the peasant's dome,
Decay asserts her dismal reign—the nide
Of feathered rovers throng the hall, or ride
Unrivalled in triumphal march—and chant
Victorious pæans o'er the clime, where's died
Each patriot passion, that could charm or daunt,
Or shed a glow o'er her, that worth made glory's haunt.

“Egeria was the child of fancy, wrought
Into a sybil, and a Pythoness,
By the credulity of man, who sought
To deck a being formed to view and bless;
She and the flamen raised Rome's glory less
Than the low archer of her phalanx'd host;
Her martial virtue, and her fearlessness
Were her omnipotent deities—when lost
The Pantheon fell, and pride fled from Baiæ's coast.

126

“The triple tiar graces ill the brow
Of him, whose palace is the Lateran,
The pomp of gemm'd canonicals, whose glow
Was dazzling—the voice of wrath, from whose ban
The soul recoiled, and quivering lips, all wan,
Ejaculated ruth—the ermined power,
Have fallen in their acme—freeborn man
No more in cells of priestcraft drags his hour
Of wretchedness—but resumes the soul's celestial tower.

“Time's mansions—cities—lords, in one dread tomb
Are now immerged—and other monarchs rise,
And reign o'er other climes—the dread simoom
Of vengeance hath blackened the bright skies
Of glory and of fame. The obsequies
Of nations time performs, and in the dust
Lays all the train of pride; the conqueror dies,
And earth receives him—but the green clods burst,
And winds herald his ashes to their mansion erst.”

The minstrel turned—and radiant flashed his eye—
“Lo! where the Atlantic laves a perfum'd shore,
And the winged glories of a distant sky,
In lambent fires of beauty, hover o'er,

127

A nation reigns; in all the vaunted lore
Of eastern sages, ne'er a reign, like this,
Was sketched in fancy; the shade of power bore
From bondaged climes, now slavery's dark abyss,
The bay, the laurel, palm, to trophy freedom's bliss.

“No proud regalia of imperial state,
Nor feudal seignories of pomp and power,
Nor pride baronial mark the noble fate
Of heaven-blest Columbia; but the hour,
That sealed her freedom, brought a blissful dower
Of wise equality in human kind;
Her patriot chiefs, 'mid glory's splendour, tower,
A golden chain each filial heart doth bind,
And harps in tones of love fling music on each wind.

“She owns no autocrat, who drives his car
O'er prostrate slaves, and lives but in their doom;
The light, that flashed from her refulgent star,
Will wane when ruin shrouds the world in gloom,
But ne'er till then! for the blasting simoom
Of chilling tyranny will rage remote.”
He said; I stood upon a lonely tomb
Amid the platted broomland—and the note
Of the soft nightingale through ether fields did float.