Classic Poem

ALL day had we been gliding o'er the seas,
With swan-like motion; for the skies were fair,
The waters smooth, or by a winning breeze,
But rippled into beauty far and near;
Our bark shot onward with a glad career,
Like a brave steed with motion swift and free;
And now, as to the growing land we near,
Its headlands rising into majesty,
The mighty sun prepares to seek the embracing sea.

It is a sovereign's burial! O'er his brow
Hangs the imperial crown, a golden sphere;
While dark, in sullen majesty below,
The waters gathering in their mighty fair,
Rise, swelling into mountains! Far and near,
Mellow'd to soften'd twilight, a repose,
Sweet as the mild breath of the autumn air,
Is down upon the earth at evening's close:
No light too strongly beams, no breath too rudely blows.

But all above and all around,—the all
That links the visible to humanity—
Wound to a pleasant and seductive fall,
Woos the worn heart and wins the weary eye;
A pale star o'er yon steep acclivity,
Beckons the modest evening to her side,
Ere yet the dying monarch has thrown by
His purple, and, with glance of love and pride,
Sends peace throughout her empire, far and wide.

A freshness in the breeze, a pleasant breath,
As of a living odor, late from vales
Undimm'd by shadow, undeprived by death,
Of greenest verdure or of sweetest gales—
At fits it swells aloft, and then exhales
Away in music,—while a muttering sound,
As of the ocean when the tempest wails,
Breaks through the yielding tree-tops—all around
The day droops faintly clear, but purples still the ground.

Far off, the tall rocks, in his latest glance,
Glow like Vesuvius! On each rugged brow
Capricious fires ascend, recede, advance,
Down sinking, then up rushing, as the flow
Of waves that seek the beach when seas are low,
Fond of old places! His sweet smile subdues
Their harsher aspects; warms with godlike glow,
The cold he may not conquer; 'till they lose
The aspects harsh and wild that still our steps refuse.

Love in his dying purpose, he relieves
The gloom of parting: thus, the cloud that far
Still follows on his footstep, now receives
His smile; and made all radiant like a star,
Glows in soft crimson and around his car
Curtains his couch as downward still he hies;—
Tempering the glorious light it may not mar,
The lovely drapery closes o'er his eyes,
Yet keeps his latest gift, his robe of thousand dyes.

Leap the wild billows round him as he goes,
Reddening their edges as in noonday pride;
Still struggling, as the giant girt by foes,
And failing but still fighting, eagle-eyed,
With full unfailing heart and sovereign stride,
Till the prevailing waters with wild roar,
Do homage to the glories they defied,—
Their realm of waste with fresh lights purpled o'er,
Borne far, from wave to wave, along the receding shore.

He sinks and in the heavens another star
Glides forth to her that beckon'd from the blue;
And the young moon in pearly-cinctured car,
Rides up where ocean's barriers bind the view.
Silvering the cloud she cannot quite subdue,
Soothing the strife she may not hope to sway,
Her chaster livery chides the purple's hue,
And drapes the glare that made the garish day:
Thus Love doth Glory spell to choose her milder way.