hort before,
With grief is silenced forevermore.

Like pigeons, cooing in anxious calling,
You sigh for morn, with to-day not through,
When, unbethought, like a trap-door falling,
The earth unlocketh itself for you--
You disappear
Where no light is nearing--
Soon mem'ry dear
Is no more endearing--
And new-lit moon, from its silvered sky,
Again, sees others arrive and fly.

In circling dances so lightly swinging
You follow wildly amusement's thread,
With myrtle blooming and music ringing ...
But solemn I on the threshold tread:--
The dance is checked
And the clang is wailing,
The wreath is wrecked
And the bride is paling:
The end of splendor and joy and might
Is only sorrow and tears and blight.

I am the mighty, who has the power,
Till yet a mightier shall appear.
In deepest pit, on the highest tower,
My chilling spirit is ever near:
Those plagues of night
And of desolation,
Whose breath of blight
May annul a nation,
They slay the victims, which I select,
Whom shield and armor can not protect.

I wrap the wing round the polar tempest
And calm the waves ere they reach the strand.
I crush the schemes of dynastic conquest,
And wrench the club from the tyrant's hand.
I eras chase,
Like the hour just passing;
And race on race,
With their works amassing,
Like heaving waves, in my footsteps flow,
Till, last, no ripples their murmur show.

'Gainst me in vain are your wit and letters,
'Gainst me nor weapons nor arts prevail.
I freedom give to the slave in fetters,--
His ruler's will I in irons nail.
I lead the battle--
And armies tumble,
Like slaughtered cattle,
While cannons rumble,
And never rise from their sudden fall
Until alarmed by the judgment-call.

I wave my hand--and, with whirlwinds' sweeping
All life on earth to that place doth fly,
Where not a sound to the ear is creeping,
Where not a tongue moves to make reply.
My foot meanders--
And kings and heroes,
And Alexanders,
And wicked Neros,
And princes, lofty in might and lust,
Are all transformed to--a handful dust.

In lowly earth, upon which they bothe