Classic Poem

Thus spake to Man the thousand-throated Sea;
Words which the stealing winds caught from its lips:

Thou thinkest thee and thine, God's topmost crown.
But hearken unto me and humbly learn
How infinite thine insignificance.
Thou boastest of thine age — thy works — thyself:
Thine oldest monuments of which thou prat'st
Were built but yesterday when measured by
Yon snow-domed mountains of eternal rock:
The Earth, thy mother, from whose breast thou draw'st,
The sweat-stained living which she wills to give,
And in whose dust thine own must melt again,
Was aged cycles ere thine earliest dawn; —
But they to me are young: I gave them birth.
Climb up those heaven-tipt peaks thy dizziest height,
Thou there shalt read, graved deep, my name and age;
Dig down thy deepest depth, shalt read them still.
Before the mountains sprang, before the Earth,
Thy cradle and thy tomb, was made, I was:
God called them forth from me, as thee from Earth.
Thou burrow'st through a mountain, here and there,
Work'st all thine engines, cutting off a speck;
I wash their rock-foundations under; tear
Turret from turret, toppling thundering down,
And crush their mightiest fragments into sand:
Thou gravest with thy records slab and spar,
And callest them memorials of thy Might; —
Lo! not a stone exists, from yon black cliff
To that small pebble at thy foot, but bears
My signature graved there when Earth was young,
To teach the mighty wonders of the Deep.
Thy deeds — thyself — are what? A morning mist!
But I! I face the ages. Dost not know
That as I gave the Earth to spread her fair
And dew-washed body in the morning light,
So, still, 't is I that keep her fair and fresh? —
That weave her robes and nightly diamond them?
I fill her odorous bowers with perfumes rare;
Strew field and forest with bee-haunted stars;
I give the Morn pearl for her radiant roof,
And Eve lend glory for her rosy dome;
I build the purple towers that hold the West
And guard the passage of Retiring Day.
Thy frailest fabric far outlasts thyself:
The pyramids rise from the desert sands,
Their builders blown in dust about their feet.
The winged bull looms mid an alien race,
Grim, silent, lone. But whither went the King?
I cool the lambent air upon my breast,
And send the winds forth on mine embassies;
I offer all my body to the Sun,
And lade our caravans with merchandise,
To carry wealth and plenty to all climes.
Yon fleecy continents of floating snow,
That dwarf the mountains over which they sail,
Are but my bales borne by my messengers,
To cheer and gladden every thirsty land.
The Arab by his palm-girt desert pool,
The Laplander above his frozen rill,
The Woodsman crouched beside his forest brook,
The shepherd mirrored in his upland spring,
Drink of my cup in one great brotherhood.
'T is, nay, not man alone — thou art but one
Of all the myriads of life-holding things, —
Brute, beast, bird, reptile, insect, thing unnamed,
Whose souls find recreation in my breath:
Nay, not a tree, flower, sprig of grass or weed,
But lives through me and hymns my praise to God:
I feed, sustain, refresh and keep them all:
Mirror and type of God that giveth life.
I sing as softly as a mother croons
Her drowsy babe to sleep upon her breast.
On quiet nights when all my winds are laid,
I wile the stars down from their azure home
To sink with golden footprints in my depths:
I show the silvered pathway to the moon,
All paved with gems the errant Pleiad lost,
That night she strayed from her sisters wan;
But I sing other times strains from that song
Before whose awfulness my waters sank,
And at whose harmony the mountains rose,
I heard that morning when the breath of God
Moved on my face, and said, Let there be light!
I thrill and tremble since but at the thought
Of that great wonder of that greatest dawn,
When at God's word the brooding darkness rose,
Which veiled my face from all the birth of things
And rolled far frighted from its resting-place,
To bide henceforth beyond Day's crystal walls,
While all the morning stars together sang,
And on the instant God stood full revealed!