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(Excerpt)
I CLIMB the highest cliff: I hear the sound | |
| Of dashing waves; I gaze intent around: | |
| I mark the sun that orient lifts his head! | |
| I mark the sea’s lone rule beneath him spread: | |
| But not a speck can my long-straining eye, | 5 |
| A shadow, o’er the tossing waste descry, | |
| That I might weep tears of delight, and say, | |
| “It is the bark that bore my child away!” | |
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| Thou sun, that beamest bright, beneath whose eye | |
| The worlds unknown, and outstretched waters, lie, | 10 |
| Dost thou behold him now? On some rude shore, | |
| Around whose crags the cheerless billows roar, | |
| Watching the unwearied surges doth he stand, | |
| And think upon his father’s distant land? | |
| Or has his heart forgot, so far away, | 15 |
| These native scenes, these rocks and torrents gray, | |
| The tall bananas whispering to the breeze, | |
| The shores, the sound of these encircling seas, | |
| Heard from his infant days, and the piled heap | |
| Of holy stones, where his forefathers sleep? | 20 |
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| Ah me! till sunk by sorrow, I shall dwell | |
| With them forgetful in the narrow cell, | |
| Never shall time from my fond heart efface | |
| His image; oft his shadow I shall trace | |
| Upon the glimmering waters, when on high | 25 |
| The white moon wanders through the cloudless sky. | |
| Oft in my silent cave (when to its fire | |
| From the night’s rushing tempest we retire) | |
| I shall behold his form, his aspect bland; | |
| I shall retrace his footsteps in the sand; | 30 |
| And, when the hollow-sounding surges swell, | |
| Still think I listen to his echoing shell. * * * * * | |
| O, I shall never, never hear his voice; | |
| The spring-time shall return, the isles rejoice; | |
| But faint and weary I shall meet the morn, | 35 |
| And mid the cheering sunshine droop forlorn! | |
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| The joyous conch sounds in the high wood loud, | |
| O’er all the beach now stream the busy crowd; | |
| Fresh breezes stir the waving plantain grove; | |
| The fisher carols in the winding cove; | 40 |
| And light canoes along the lucid tide | |
| With painted shells and sparkling paddles glide. | |
| I linger on the desert rock alone, | |
| Heartless, and cry for thee, my son, my son. | |
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