Jedidiah Vincent Huntington (1815-1862). On Reading Bryant's Poem of "The Winds." Hunt and Lee, comps. 1867. The Book of the Sonnet

Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867.

On Reading Bryant’s Poem of “The Winds”

By Jedidiah Vincent Huntington (1815–1862)


YE winds! whose various voices in his lay
That bard interpreted,—your utterance mild,
Nor less your ministration, fierce and wild,
Of those resistless laws which ye obey
In your apparent lawlessness,—O, say,	5
Is not your will-less agency reviled
When it is likened unto what is styled
By such unwise, The Spirit of the Day?
Not all the islands by tornadoes swept,
E’er knew such ruin as befalls a state,	10
When not the winds of God, but mortal breath,
With threatening sweetness of melodious hate,
Assaults the fabrics reverent ages kept
To shelter ancient loyalty and faith.