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Thomas Cole's poetry

the collected poems of America's foremost painter of the Hudson River School reflecting his feelings for nature and the romantic spirit of the Nineteenth Century

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10. Niagara
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50

10.
Niagara

Softly the light in these umbrageous realms
Falls on the path, and plays upon the leaf—
Softly the breeze now whispering steals between
The thousand pillars of the quiet wood—
And we with gentle musings, and fond thoughts
Untroubled, free, pursue our pleasant way—
What sound is that careering on the wings
Of stormy blasts, so mightily and fills
The lofty arches of the forest wide?
Is it the clamor of impetuous winds
That strive for egress from some rock-bound cave?
Or is an earthquake waking from its wrath
And from the high unstable mountain tops
Hurling the ponderous and rebounding rocks?
No! tis Niagara shouts from the abyss
Where headlong he has cast him in his might!
And rocks, and woods, and the astounded air,
And earth's deep center tremble as with fear—
Approach and view the wonder of a world
See! when the waters of a hundred lakes
An unheaped multitude tumultuous leap
O'er the projecting crags, into the gulf—
Thence the thick mist perpetual ascends,
In cloudy piles into the sky and hides,
The quivering torment of the floods below—
Like steam emitted from some cauldron vast
Vexed by furious and unquenching fires—
Thou consummation of the earth's sublime!
Thy course nor time, nor tide, nor change hath stemmed!

51

Thy voice hath risen above the tempest's roar
Year after year till countless they are grown—
Seasons have looked upon thee and have died—
Ages have vanish'd and the earth grown old—
Man who hath moved mountains, bound the sea,
Awe-struck recoils and works on thee no change
The earth hath much of beauty but the choice
Is garlanded around thine august brows—
Yon, flaky foam is white as alpine snow—
Yon gushing emerald clear as ocean's depths—
The bow of promise sits on sable clouds;
But lo! a far excelling iris girds
The dazzling splendour of thy snowy breast—
Ages untold thy voice broke forth unheard;
But by the shrinking wolf, or the tim'rous deer
Or wandering savage of the echoing wild—
Until an enterprise sublime unbarred
The mighty portals of the golden west
And midst its teeming fulness thou wast found
Majestic in the wilderness enthroned—
Written at the Falls May, 1829