The Centennial of William Cullen Bryant's Birth

The age its latest decade shows,The wondrous century nears its close,Revealing in its fateful span,Unwonted ways of good to man.

Imprisoned vapor speeds its course,Flies, quick with life, th' electric force,Nature's dæmonic mysteriesAre angels now that win and please.

Above the wild industrial din,The race an hundred goals to win,The gathered wealth, the rifled mine,Still sounds the poet's song divine;

And Skill that marshals myriad handsFor manhood's task in many lands,Attunes her anvil by the lyre,And forges with Promethean fire.

O master of imperial lays,Crowned in the fullness of thy days,One heart that owns thy gracious spellThy revere mien remembers well.

For mine it was, ere fell the snowUpon this head of long ago,My modest wreath to intertwineWith richer offerings at thy shrine.

A guest upon that day of days,How leapt my heart to hymn thy praise!Yea, from that hour my spirit woreA high content unknown before.

The past engulfs these echoes fond;Thou and thy mates have passed beyond,And that fair festival appearsDim through the vista of long years.

But love still keeps his watch below,When fades from sight the sunset glow,And at the challenge of thy nameStirs in each heart the loyal flame.

Still battling on the field of life,We break from the unequal strife,From task or pastime hasten allAs at a vanished leader's call.

Within the shadow of thy tentWe read again thy testament,Review the treasure which thy artBequeathed t' enrich thy country's heart.

No gift whose precious bloom can fade,No holocaust on false shrine laid,A legacy of good untold,August as oracles of old,The winged words that cannot die,The world-transcending prophecy.