| |
| A MIGHTY Hand, from an exhaustless Urn, | |
| Pours forth the never-ending Flood of Years, | |
| Among the nations. How the rushing waves | |
| Bear all before them! On their foremost edge, | |
| And there alone, is Life. The Present there | 5 |
| Tosses and foams, and fills the air with roar | |
| Of mingled noises. There are they who toil, | |
| And they who strive, and they who feast, and they | |
| Who hurry to and fro. The sturdy swain— | |
| Woodman and delver with the spade—is there, | 10 |
| And busy artisan beside his bench, | |
| And pallid student with his written roll. | |
| A moment on the mounting billow seen, | |
| The flood sweeps over them and they are gone. | |
| There groups of revellers whose brows are twined | 15 |
| With roses, ride the topmost swell awhile, | |
| And as they raise their flowing cups and touch | |
| The clinking brim to brim, are whirled beneath | |
| The waves and disappear. I hear the jar | |
| Of beaten drums, and thunders that break forth | 20 |
| From cannon, where the advancing billow sends | |
| Up to the sight long files of armëd men, | |
| That hurry to the charge through flame and smoke. | |
| The torrent bears them under, whelmed and hid, | |
| Slayer and slain, in heaps of bloody foam. | 25 |
| Down go the steed and rider, the plumed chief | |
| Sinks with his followers; the head that wears | |
| The imperial diadem goes down beside | |
| The felon’s with cropped ear and branded cheek. | |
| A funeral-train—the torrent sweeps away | 30 |
| Bearers and bier and mourners. By the bed | |
| Of one who dies men gather sorrowing, | |
| And women weep aloud; the flood rolls on; | |
| The wail is stifled and the sobbing group | |
| Borne under. Hark to that shrill, sudden shout, | 35 |
| The cry of an applauding multitude, | |
| Swayed by some loud-voiced orator who wields | |
| The living mass as if he were its soul! | |
| The waters choke the shout and all is still. | |
| Lo! next a kneeling crowd, and one who spreads | 40 |
| The hands in prayer—the engulfing wave o’ertakes | |
| And swallows them and him. A sculptor wields | |
| The chisel, and the stricken marble grows | |
| To beauty; at his easel, eager-eyed, | |
| A painter stands, and sunshine at his touch | 45 |
| Gathers upon his canvas, and life glows; | |
| A poet, as he paces to and fro, | |
| Murmurs his sounding lines. A while they ride | |
| The advancing billow, till its tossing crest | |
| Strikes them and flings them under, while their tasks | 50 |
| Are yet unfinished. See a mother smile | |
| On her young babe that smiles to her again; | |
| The torrent wrests it from her arms; she shrieks | |
| And weeps, and midst her tears is carried down. | |
| A beam like that of moonlight turns the spray | 55 |
| To glistening pearls; two lovers, hand in hand, | |
| Rise on the billowy swell and fondly look | |
| Into each other’s eyes. The rushing flood | |
| Flings them apart: the youth goes down; the maid | |
| With hands outstretched in vain, and streaming eyes, | 60 |
| Waits for the next high wave to follow him. | |
| An aged man succeeds; his bending form | |
| Sinks slowly. Mingling with the sullen stream | |
| Gleam the white locks, and then are seen no more. | |
| Lo! wider grows the stream—a sea-like flood | 65 |
| Saps earth’s walled cities; massive palaces | |
| Crumble before it; fortresses and towers | |
| Dissolve in the swift waters; populous realms | |
| Swept by the torrent see their ancient tribes | |
| Engulfed and lost; their very languages | 70 |
| Stifled, and never to be uttered more. | |
| I pause and turn my eyes, and looking back | |
| Where that tumultuous flood has been, I see | |
| The silent ocean of the Past, a waste | |
| Of waters weltering over graves, its shores | 75 |
| Strewn with the wreck of fleets where mast and hull | |
| Drop away piecemeal; battlemented walls | |
| Frown idly, green with moss, and temples stand | |
| Unroofed, forsaken by the worshipper. | |
| There lie memorial stones, whence time has gnawed | 80 |
| The graven legends, thrones of kings o’er-turned, | |
| The broken altars of forgotten gods, | |
| Foundations of old cities and long streets | |
| Where never fall of human foot is heard, | |
| On all the desolate pavement. I behold | 85 |
| Dim glimmerings of lost jewels, far within | |
| The sleeping waters, diamond, sardonyx, | |
| Ruby and topaz, pearl and chrysolite, | |
| Once glittering at the banquet on fair brows | |
| That long ago were dust; and all around | 90 |
| Strewn on the surface of that silent sea | |
| Are withering bridal wreaths, and glossy locks | |
| Shorn from dear brows by loving hands, and scrolls | |
| O’erwritten, haply with fond words of love | |
| And vows of friendship, and fair pages flung | 95 |
| Fresh from the printer’s engine. There they lie | |
| A moment, and then sink away from sight. | |
| I look, and the quick tears are in my eyes, | |
| For I behold in every one of these | |
| A blighted hope, a separate history | 100 |
| Of human sorrows, telling of dear ties | |
| Suddenly broken, dreams of happiness | |
| Dissolved in air, and happy days too brief | |
| That sorrowfully ended, and I think | |
| How painfully must the poor heart have beat | 105 |
| In bosoms without number, as the blow | |
| Was struck that slew their hope and broke their peace. | |
| Sadly I turn and look before, where yet | |
| The Flood must pass, and I behold a mist | |
| Where swarm dissolving forms, the brood of Hope, | 110 |
| Divinely fair, that rest on banks of flowers, | |
| Or wander among rainbows, fading soon | |
| And reappearing, haply giving place | |
| To forms of grisly aspect such as Fear | |
| Shapes from the idle air—where serpents lift | 115 |
| The head to strike, and skeletons stretch forth | |
| The bony arm in menace. Further on | |
| A belt of darkness seems to bar the way | |
| Long, low, and distant, where the Life to come | |
| Touches the Life that is. The Flood of Years | 120 |
| Rolls toward it near and nearer. It must pass | |
| That dismal barrier. What is there beyond? | |
| Hear what the wise and good have said. Beyond | |
| That belt of darkness, still the Years roll on | |
| More gently, but with not less mighty sweep. | 125 |
| They gather up again and softly bear | |
| All the sweet lives that late were over-whelmed | |
| And lost to sight, all that in them was good, | |
| Noble, and truly great, and worthy of love— | |
| The lives of infants and ingenuous youths, | 130 |
| Sages and saintly women who have made | |
| Their households happy; all are raised and borne | |
| By that great current in its onward sweep, | |
| Wandering and rippling with caressing waves | |
| Around green islands with the breath | 135 |
| Of flowers that never wither. So they pass | |
| From stage to stage along the shining course | |
| Of that bright river, broadening like a sea. | |
| As its smooth eddies curl along their way | |
| They bring old friends together; hands are clasped | 140 |
| In joy unspeakable; the mother’s arms | |
| Again are folded round the child she loved | |
| And lost. Old sorrows are forgotten now, | |
| Or but remembered to make sweet the hour | |
| That overpays them; wounded hearts that bled | 145 |
| Or broke are healed forever. In the room | |
| Of this grief-shadowed present, there shall be | |
| A Present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw | |
| The heart, and never shall a tender tie | |
| Be broken; in whose reign the eternal Change | 150 |
| That waits on growth and action shall proceed | |
| With everlasting Concord hand in hand. | |
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