Classic Poem

Time! thou destroy'st the relics of the Past
And hidest all the footprints of thy march
On shattered column and on crumbled arch,
By moss and ivy growing green and fast.
Hurled into fragments by the tempest-blast,
The Rhodian monster lies; the obelisk,
That with sharp line divided the broad disc
Of Egypt's sun, down to the sands was cast: —
And where these stood, no remnant-trophy stands,
And even the art is lost by which they rose:
Thus, with the monuments of other lands —
The place that knew them now no longer knows.
Yet triumph not, oh Time; strong towers decay,
But a great name shall never pass away!