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Oxford Prize Poem, 1823
WRAPT in the veil of time’s unbroken gloom, | |
| Obscure as death and silent as the tomb, | |
| Where cold oblivion holds her dusky reign, | |
| Frowns the dark pile on Sarum’s lonely plain. | |
| Yet think not here with classic eye to trace | 5 |
| Corinthian beauty or Ionian grace; | |
| No pillared lines with sculptured foliage crowned, | |
| No fluted remnants deck the hallowed ground; | |
| Firm, as implanted by some Titan’s might, | |
| Each rugged stone uprears its giant height, | 10 |
| Whence the poised fragment tottering seems to throw | |
| A trembling shadow on the plain below, | |
| Here oft, when evening sheds her twilight ray, | |
| And gilds with fainter beam departing day, | |
| With breathless gaze, and cheek with terror pale, | 15 |
| The lingering shepherd startles at the tale, | |
| How at deep midnight by the moon’s chill glance, | |
| Unearthly forms prolong the viewless dance; | |
| While on each whispering breeze that murmurs by, | |
| His busied fancy hears the hollow sigh. | 20 |
| Rise from thy haunt, dread genius of the clime, | |
| Rise, magic spirit of forgotten time! | |
| ’T is thine to burst the mantling clouds of age, | |
| And fling new radiance on tradition’s page: | |
| See! at thy call from fable’s varied store, | 25 |
| In shadowy train the mingled visions pour; | |
| Here the wild Briton, mid his wilder reign, | |
| Spurns the proud yoke and scorns the oppressor’s chain; | |
| Here wizard Merlin, where the mighty fell, | |
| Waves the dark wand and chants the thrilling spell. | 30 |
| Hark! ’t is the bardic lyre whose harrowing strain | |
| Wakes the rude echoes of the slumbering plain; | |
| Lo! ’t is the Druid pomp, whose lengthening line | |
| In lowliest homage bends before the shrine. | |
| He comes—the priest—amid the sullen blaze | 35 |
| His snow-white robe in spectral lustre plays; | |
| Dim gleam the torches through the circling night, | |
| Dark curl the vapors round the altar’s light; | |
| O’er the black scene of death each conscious star, | |
| In lurid glory rolls its silent car. | 40 |
| ’T is gone! e’en now the mystic horrors fade | |
| From Sarum’s loneliness and Mona’s glade; | |
| Hushed is each note of Taliesin’s lyre, | |
| Sheathed the fell blade and quenched the fatal fire. | |
| On wings of light hope’s angel form appears, | 45 |
| Smiles on the past and points to happier years; | |
| Points with uplifted hand and raptured eye | |
| To yon pure dawn that floods the opening sky, | |
| And views at length the Sun of Judah pour | |
| One cloudless noon o’er Albion’s rescued shore. | 50 |
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