Classic Poem

The huge winds gather on the midnight lake,
Shaggy with rain and loud with foam-white feet,
Then bound through miles of darkness till they meet
The harboured ships and city's squares, and wake
From steeples, domes and houses, sounds that take
A human speech, the storm's mad course to greet;
And nightmare voices through the rain and sleet
Pass shrieking, till the town's rock-sinews shake.

Howl, winds, around us in this silent room!
Wild lake, with thunders beat thy prison bars!
A brother's life is ebbing fast away,
And, mounting on your music through the gloom,
A pure soul mingles with the morning stars,
And with them melts into the blaze of day.