The sea-bird, from her snowy stone,
Beheld it floating on,
Like a bride that bent her way
To the altar, standing lone,
In some cathedral gray.
The melancholy wave
Started at the cry she gave,
Hailing the lovely child
Of the immortal sun,--
A tender and a tearful one,
Bounding away, with footsteps wild!
Old Neptune on his silver bed
The dazzling image threw;
It laid like sunbeam on the dew,
Its young tress-waving head.
The god upon the shadow gazed,
And silently upraised
A gentle wave, that came and kiss'd
Fair Iris in her holy rest.
Her pearly brow grew pale:
It felt the sinful fire,
And from her queenly tiar
She drew the veil.
The sun-wing'd steeds her sacred car
Wheel'd to her throne of star.
TO A SPIRIT
Spirit! in deathless halo zoned,
A chain of stars with wings of diamond,--
Is music blended into thee
With holy light and immortality?
For, as thy shape of glory swept
Through seas of darkness, magic breathings fell
Around it, like the notes that slept
In the wild caverns of a silver shell.
Pages:
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75