THE HEAVENS.
What Alps of clouds! The distant, airy deep
Is lightning-rent, and fleecy mountains tower,
Pile over pile, and drift across the blue,
Wild-driven by the warm, fierce wind that blows
From fiery Mars; while, through their rifts and chasms,
Shines the pure ether of the outer realm,
And links the lone earth to her sister spheres.
Glorious! The Universe is mine the while!
Fleet Mercury, companion of the sun,
And loitering Neptune with his darkened years,
And all the myriad, myriad worlds that roll
Beyond our vision dim, but seen of God,
And heard in symphonies about his throne.
And if, above the splendor of these cliffs,
Some white-winged angel should this moment poise,
And in a voice of luring sweetness sing,
"Come hither, hither with the seraphim!"
I should as lightly follow as the child,
Who, tired of silent books and narrow walls,
Hears from the garden bowers his mother call,
And runs to meet her, knowing they shall roam
Is lightning-rent, and fleecy mountains tower,
Pile over pile, and drift across the blue,
Wild-driven by the warm, fierce wind that blows
From fiery Mars; while, through their rifts and chasms,
Shines the pure ether of the outer realm,
And links the lone earth to her sister spheres.
Glorious! The Universe is mine the while!
Fleet Mercury, companion of the sun,
And loitering Neptune with his darkened years,
And all the myriad, myriad worlds that roll
Beyond our vision dim, but seen of God,
And heard in symphonies about his throne.
And if, above the splendor of these cliffs,
Some white-winged angel should this moment poise,
And in a voice of luring sweetness sing,
"Come hither, hither with the seraphim!"
I should as lightly follow as the child,
Who, tired of silent books and narrow walls,
Hears from the garden bowers his mother call,
And runs to meet her, knowing they shall roam
