Page:Fugitive Poetry 1600-1878.djvu/122
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104
THE WORLD'S CHANGES.
How marvelled the Shadow! "Where then is the plain?
And where be the acres of golden grain?"
But the fisher dashed off the salt spray from his brow—
"The waters begirdle the earth away,
The sea ever rolled as it rolleth now;
What babblest thou about grain and fields?
By night and day,
Man looks for what ocean yields."
And after a thousand years were o'er,
The shadow paused over the spot once more.
And where be the acres of golden grain?"
But the fisher dashed off the salt spray from his brow—
"The waters begirdle the earth away,
The sea ever rolled as it rolleth now;
What babblest thou about grain and fields?
By night and day,
Man looks for what ocean yields."
And after a thousand years were o'er,
The shadow paused over the spot once more.
And the ruddy rays of the eventide,
Were gilding the skirts of a forest wide;
The moss of the trees looked old, so old!
And valley and hill, the ancient mould,
Was robed in sward, an evergreen cloak;
And a woodman sang as he felled an oak.
Him asked the shadow—"Rememberest thou,
Any trace of a sea where wave those trees?"
But the woodman laughed; said he, "I trow,
If oaks and pines do flourish and fall,
It is not amid seas;
The earth is one forest all."
And after a thousand years were o'er,
The shadow paused over the spot once more.
Were gilding the skirts of a forest wide;
The moss of the trees looked old, so old!
And valley and hill, the ancient mould,
Was robed in sward, an evergreen cloak;
And a woodman sang as he felled an oak.
Him asked the shadow—"Rememberest thou,
Any trace of a sea where wave those trees?"
But the woodman laughed; said he, "I trow,
If oaks and pines do flourish and fall,
It is not amid seas;
The earth is one forest all."
And after a thousand years were o'er,
The shadow paused over the spot once more.
And what saw the shadow? A city again,
But peopled by pale, mechanical men,
With workhouses filled, and prisons, and marts,
And faces that spake exanimate hearts.
"Strange pictures and sad!" was the shadow's thought;
And turning to one of the ghastly, he sought
For a clue in words to the when and the how,
Of the ominous change he now beheld;
But the man uplifted his careworn brow—
"Change? What was life ever but conflict and change?
From the ages of old,
Hath affliction been widening its range."
But peopled by pale, mechanical men,
With workhouses filled, and prisons, and marts,
And faces that spake exanimate hearts.
"Strange pictures and sad!" was the shadow's thought;
And turning to one of the ghastly, he sought
For a clue in words to the when and the how,
Of the ominous change he now beheld;
But the man uplifted his careworn brow—
"Change? What was life ever but conflict and change?
From the ages of old,
Hath affliction been widening its range."
"Enough!" said the shadow, and passed from the spot;
"At last it is vanished, the beautiful youth
Of the earth, to return with no to-morrow;
All changes have chequered mortality's lot;
But this is the darkest—for knowledge and truth,
Are but golden gates to the temple of sorrow!"
"At last it is vanished, the beautiful youth
Of the earth, to return with no to-morrow;
All changes have chequered mortality's lot;
But this is the darkest—for knowledge and truth,
Are but golden gates to the temple of sorrow!"
