Classic Poem

He wrestles with the weather: He divines
The things that shall be from the things that are;
He knows the occultations and the signs
Of each prognostic star.

From the low murmur of the moonless seas
He learns their deepest secrets, and doth scan
The midnight heaven's moving mysteries,
To publish them to man.

The chariots of the Wind, whose wheels outrun
Centaurus, in his flashing course on high,
He stayeth with a sign. The flaming Sun
Winks to him from the sky!

His home is in the black domain of storm,
And in the dying sunset's gold alike;
He laugheth at the thunder, and his form
No lightning dares to strike!

So Fancy paints him. Others as a sage
Describe him — of a grave sagacious look,
Deciphering symbols from the antique page
Of some mysterious book.

Thermometers and barometric scales,
Wind gauges, and machines of strange designs
Surround him as he plans the tides and gales,
And unto each assigns

Its area and its predetermined course,
And scores it in a chart that we may learn
Its natural law, duration, average force,
And period of return.

But whether man or myth, he turns the mill
That grinds the weather out from day to day;
And when we cannot have it as we will,
We bear it as we may.

Hemans declares " Leaves have their time to fall; "
To which I add — and thieves their time to rob
Henhouses, barns and banks: but thou hast all
Times for thine own, Old Prob.!

Then go thy ways! old necromancer quaint,
And flash thy prophecies from post to post;
Enduring still our querulous complaint
When thou dost vex us most:

For whether Winter's frost or Summers heat
Freeze us or fry us, little heed to man
Thou givest, following still in cycles meet,
The old, eternal plan.