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I. HERE let me pause by the lone eagle’s nest, | |
| And breathe the golden sunlight and sweet air, | |
| Which gird and gladden all this region fair | |
| With a perpetual benison of rest; | |
| Like a grand purpose that some god hath blest, | 5 |
| The immemorial mountain seems to rise, | |
| Yearning to overtop diviner skies, | |
| Though monarch of the pomps of East and West; | |
| And pondering here, the Genius of the height | |
| Quickens my soul as if an angel spake, | 10 |
| And I can feel old chains of custom break, | |
| And old ambitious start to win the light; | |
| A calm resolve born with them, in whose might | |
| I thank thee, Heaven! that noble thoughts awake. | |
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II. THE RAINBOWS of the heaven are not more rare, | 15 |
| More various and more beautiful to view, | |
| Than these rich forest rainbows, dipped in dew | |
| Of morn and evening, glimmering everywhere | |
| From wooded dell to dark blue mountain mere; | |
| O Autumn! marvellous painter! every hue | 20 |
| Of thy immortal pencil is steeped through | |
| With essence of divinity; how bare | |
| Beside thy coloring the poor shows of Art, | |
| Though Art were thrice inspired; in dreams alone | |
| (The loftiest dreams wherein the soul takes part) | 25 |
| Of jasper pavements, and the sapphire throne | |
| Of Heaven, hath such unearthly brightness shone | |
| To flush, and thrill the visionary heart! | |
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III. HERE, friend! upon this lofty ledge sit down, | |
| And view the beauteous prospect spread below, | 30 |
| Around, above us; in the noonday glow | |
| How calm the landscape rests!—yon distant town, | |
| Enwreathed with clouds of foliage like a crown | |
| Of rustic honor; the soft, silvery flow | |
| Of the clear stream beyond it, and the show | 35 |
| Of endless wooded heights, circling the brown | |
| Autumnal fields, alive with billowy grain;— | |
| Say, hast thou ever gazed on aught more fair | |
| In Europe, or the Orient?—what domain | |
| (From India to the sunny slopes of Spain) | 40 |
| Hath beauty, wed to grandeur in the air, | |
| Blessed with an ampler charm, a more benignant reign? | |
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