Classic Poem

BOOK I.

Dear Ellen Rendall! seers have said
That of his realm of giant oak,
O'er valley, plain, and mountain spread
Ere echo mock'd the woodman's stroke,
Barbarian man the temple made,
Where first Religion kneel'd and pray'd;
The green cathedral of the soul
Whose god was in the thunder's roll.
'Twas finely thought, and sagely, too;
The beautiful is ever true.
But I the temple dread would paint
Where primal fraud was terror's saint.
Thou Ellen, thy young grace and truth,
May wake in me a dream of youth,
But cannot sweep the mist away
From hoar tradition's dateless day;
And if no scene can now be found
Which fancy might deem haunted ground,
How shall the Muse of bed-rid age
Construct for Eld a hermitage,
Where he may bend dejected o'er
Old dust, whose history no man tells.
And homes of glory now no more?
His old eyes full of doubt, and dim
With grief! his old beard jagg'd and torn,
And hung with weeping icicles!
The only old tree mocking him!
The old rocks laughing him to scorn!
Add the old skies (with tears, at morn,
Implor'd some little grace to show him,)
Looking as if they did not know him!