Before that human step had left
Its sully on thy brow,
The glory of thy forehead made
A shrine to those below:
Men gaz'd upon thee as a star,
And turned to earth again,
With dreams like thine own floating clouds,
The vague but not the vain.
No feelings are less vain than those
That bear the mind away,
Till blent with nature's mysteries
It half forgets its clay.
It catches loftier impulses;
And owns a nobler power;—
The poet and philosopher
Are born of such an hour.
But now where may we seek a place
For any spirit's dream;
Our steps have been o'er every soil,
Our sails o'er every stream.
Those isles, the beautiful Azores,
The fortunate, the fair!
We looked for their perpetual spring
To find it was not there.
Bright El Dorado, land of gold,
We have so sought for thee,
There's not a spot in all the globe
Where such a land can be.
