Classic Poem

The boundless life of music now at times
Descends upon us: — lo! we form a part
Of music's wide unutterable heart,
And mix, in rapture, with the eternal rhymes.
We traverse, in a dream, strange spirit-climes;
We hear strange oceans beating on white shores;
We thread strange rivers to the plash of oars
Unearthly, ringing round us silvery chimes.

The spirit of music lifts us, — and our love
Becomes a passion every change above:
The spirit of music aids us, and its fire
Is one with us in one intense desire:
The spirit of music bears us towards that sea
Whose blue waves murmur — " Immortality. "