Classic Poem

He leaned above the ledge. Below
He saw the black ship grope and cruise,—
A midge below, a mile below.
His limbs were knotted as the thews
Of Hercules in his death-throe.

The flame! the flame! the envious flame!
She wound her arms, she wound her hair
About his tall form, grand and bare,
To stay the fierce flame where it came.

The black ship, like some moonlit wreck,
Below along the burning sea
Groped on and on all silently,
With silent pigmies on her deck.

That midge-like ship, far, far below;
That mirage lifting from the hill!
His flame-lit form began to grow,—
To glow and grow more grandly still.
The ship so small, that form so tall,
It grew to tower over all.

A tall Colossus, bronze and gold,
As if that flame-lit form were he
Who once bestrode the Rhodian sea,
And ruled the watery world of old:
As if the lost Colossus stood
Above that burning sea of wood.

And she! that shapely form upheld,
Held high as if to touch the sky,
What airy shape, how shapely high,—
What goddess of the seas of eld!

Her hand upheld, her high right hand,
As if she would forget the land;
As if to gather stars, and heap
The stars like torches there to light
Her hero's path across the deep
To some far isle that fearful night.