| |
| THE DEEP, transparent sky is full | |
| Of many thousand glittering lights,— | |
| Unnumbered stars that calmly rule | |
| The dark dominions of the night. | |
| The mild, bright moon has upward risen, | 5 |
| Out of the gray and boundless plain, | |
| And all around the white snows glisten, | |
| Where frost and ice and silence reign,— | |
| While ages roll away, and they unchanged remain. | |
| |
| These mountains, piercing the blue sky | 10 |
| With their eternal cones of ice; | |
| The torrents dashing from on high, | |
| O’er rock and crag and precipice; | |
| Change not, but still remain as ever, | |
| Unwasting, deathless, and sublime, | 15 |
| And will remain while lightnings quiver, | |
| Or stars the hoary summits climb, | |
| Or rolls the thunder-chariot of eternal Time. | |
| |
| It is not so with all,—I change, | |
| And waste as with a living death, | 20 |
| Like one that hath become a strange, | |
| Unwelcome guest, and lingereth | |
| Among the memories of the past, | |
| Where he is a forgotten name; | |
| For Time hath greater power to blast | 25 |
| The hopes, the feelings, and the fame, | |
| To make the passions fierce, or their first strength to tame. | |
| |
| The wind comes rushing swift by me, | |
| Pouring its coolness on my brow; | |
| Such was I once,—as proudly free, | 30 |
| And yet, alas! how altered now! | |
| Yet, while I gaze upon yon plain, | |
| These mountains, this eternal sky, | |
| The scenes of boyhood come again, | |
| And pass before the vacant eye, | 35 |
| Still wearing something of their ancient brilliancy. | |
| |
| Yet why complain?—for what is wrong, | |
| False friends, cold-heartedness, deceit, | |
| And life already made too long, | |
| To one who walks with bleeding feet | 40 |
| Over its paths?—it will but make | |
| Death sweeter when it comes at last,— | |
| And though the trampled heart may ache, | |
| Its agony of pain is past, | |
| And calmness gathers there, while life is ebbing fast. | 45 |
| |
| Perhaps, when I have passed away, | |
| Like the sad echo of a dream, | |
| There may be some one found to say | |
| A word that might like sorrow seem. | |
| That I would have,—one saddened tear, | 50 |
| One kindly and regretting thought,— | |
| Grant me but that!—and even here, | |
| Here, in this lone, unpeopled spot, | |
| To breathe away this life of pain, I murmur not. | |
| |
