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Near Rome
THOUGH the hills are cold and snowy, | |
| And the wind drives chill to-day, | |
| My heart goes back to a spring-time, | |
| Far, far in the past away. | |
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| And I see a quaint old city, | 5 |
| Weary and worn and brown, | |
| Where the spring and the birds are so early, | |
| And the sun in such light goes down. | |
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| I remember that old-time villa | |
| Where our afternoons went by, | 10 |
| Where the suns of March flushed warmly, | |
| And spring was in earth and sky. | |
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| Out of the mouldering city,— | |
| Mouldering, old, and gray,— | |
| We sped, with a lightsome heart-thrill, | 15 |
| For a sunny, gladsome day,— | |
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| For a revel of fresh spring verdure, | |
| For a race mid springing flowers, | |
| For a vision of plashing fountains, | |
| Of birds and blossoming bowers. | 20 |
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| There were violet banks in the shadows, | |
| Violets white and blue; | |
| And a world of bright anemones, | |
| That over the terrace grew,— | |
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| Blue and orange and purple, | 25 |
| Rosy and yellow and white, | |
| Rising in rainbow bubbles, | |
| Streaking the lawns with light. | |
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| And down from the old stone-pine trees, | |
| Those far-off islands of air, | 30 |
| The birds are flinging the tidings | |
| Of a joyful revel up there. | |
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| And now for the grand old fountains, | |
| Tossing their silvery spray; | |
| Those fountains, so quaint and so many, | 35 |
| That are leaping and singing all day; | |
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| Those fountains of strange weird sculpture, | |
| With lichens and moss o’ergrown,— | |
| Are they marble greening in moss-wreaths, | |
| Or moss-wreaths whitening to stone? | 40 |
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| Down many a wild, dim pathway | |
| We ramble from morning till noon; | |
| We linger, unheeding the hours, | |
| Till evening comes all too soon. | |
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| And from out the ilex alleys, | 45 |
| Where lengthening shadows play, | |
| We look on the dreamy Campagna, | |
| All glowing with setting day,— | |
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| All melting in bands of purple, | |
| In swathings and foldings of gold, | 50 |
| In ribbons of azure and lilac, | |
| Like a princely banner unrolled. | |
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| And the smoke of each distant cottage, | |
| And the flash of each villa white, | |
| Shines out with an opal glimmer, | 55 |
| Like gems in a casket of light. | |
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| And the dome of old Saint Peter’s | |
| With a strange translucence glows, | |
| Like a mighty bubble of amethyst | |
| Floating in waves of rose. | 60 |
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| In a trance of dreamy vagueness, | |
| We, gazing and yearning, behold | |
| That city beheld by the prophet, | |
| Whose walls were transparent gold. | |
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| And, dropping all solemn and slowly, | 65 |
| To hallow the softening spell, | |
| There falls on the dying twilight | |
| The Ave Maria bell. | |
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| With a mournful, motherly softness, | |
| With a weird and weary care, | 70 |
| That strange and ancient city | |
| Seems calling the nations to prayer. | |
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| And the words that of old the angel | |
| To the mother of Jesus brought | |
| Rise like a new evangel, | 75 |
| To hallow the trance of our thought. | |
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| With the smoke of the evening incense | |
| Our thoughts are ascending then | |
| To Mary, the mother of Jesus, | |
| To Jesus, the Master of men. | 80 |
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| O city of prophets and martyrs! | |
| O shrines of the sainted dead! | |
| When, when shall the living day-spring | |
| Once more on your towers be spread? | |
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| When He who is meek and lowly | 85 |
| Shall rule in those lordly halls, | |
| And shall stand and feed as a shepherd | |
| The flock which his mercy calls,— | |
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| O, then to those noble churches, | |
| To picture and statue and gem, | 90 |
| To the pageant of solemn worship, | |
| Shall the meaning come back again. | |
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| And this strange and ancient city, | |
| In that reign of his truth and love, | |
| Shall be what it seems in the twilight, | 95 |
The type of that City above.
1860. | |
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