Silver Spring

When the Lord of Light revealedThe flashing radiance of His shield,Glorifying wave and field;When he felt he must expire,Then His orbs with blazing ireShot their dying shafts of fire;When the palpitating breezeSmote the gitterns of the trees,Like the shout of distant seas;When the jeweled birds that singMoved on rainbow-tinted wing,I beheld thy face of splendor blushing with the wild and tender,Silver Spring!

Virgin! when the shadows rollTo the ice-embattled pole,From thy sweet, pellucid soul—Each angelic host on highSees in that cerulian eyeBlossom-beauties of the sky.Blessed spirits! ye who dwellFar beyond the ether swell,How ye anthem, “It is well!”On thy bosom let me seemKerneled in a Bagdad dream,Rocked to slumber by a Seraph over thy celestial stream!

On a fairy, pensive pinionGloat I o’er thy deep dominion,Shaming e’en the Augustinian;Wonders rushing thicker—faster!Here a porphyry pilaster,Here a temple alabaster;And the sunshine as it fallsSplinters on quintillion halls,And a miracle of walls!Now thy bannerets are beaming—Now with mystic music gleamingO’er a city—gem-girt city—in a gush of dervish dreaming!

Here, ah here, the Indian maiden,When with love and languor laden,Sought thee, as the cells of Adenn;With a world of gentle guesses,In thy flood her floating tressesPoured their cascade of caresses!Here her hero from the rattleOf the crimson blows of battle,Slept beneath her soothing prattle—Slept—but, ere the sun’s decline,Like the lightning-riven pine,And his heart’s blood, Silver Billow, swept its throbbings into thine.

When the sad and solemn moonMuses o’er the lone lagoon,And laughs the melancholy loon,When the crooning winter breeze,Hapless from the Hebrides,Chafes the dead cathedral trees;’Mid the vultures muffled wails,Stifled by the panther hailsShuddering up palmetto trails;When the globe is wrought in sleep,When the gnomes their vigils keepBy the mountain and the deep—I can fancy phantom things,On their thunder-tarnished wings,Soaring with a fallen grandeur over the enchanted springs!

Dusky plume and siroc frown,Lo the night comes trampling downO’er thy palaces and town!Lo! a legion like the stars,Speeding from their crystal cars,Leap beyond the sable bars;How they glittered as they roll’d!How thy streets are stormed with gold!Undine! Undine! thou art princess of the parables of old!