Classic Poem

M OUNTAIN ! that first received the foot of man,
Giving him shelter when the shoreless flood
That whelm'd a buried world went surging by,
I see thee in thy lonely grandeur rise;
I see the white-hair'd Patriarch, as he knelt
Beside his earthen altar mid his sons,
While beat in praise the only pulse of life
Upon this buried planet. — O'er the gorged
And furrow'd soil swept forth a numerous train,
Horned, or cloven-footed, fierce or tame,
While, mix'd with song, the sound of countless wings,
His rescued prisoners, fann'd the ambient air.

The sun drew near his setting, clothed in gold,
But on the Patriarch, ere from prayer he rose,
A darkly-cinctured cloud chill tears had wept,
And rain-drops lay upon his silver hairs.
Then burst an arch of wondrous radiance forth,
Spanning the vaulted skies. Its mystic scroll
Proclaim'd the amnesty that pitying heaven
Granted to earth, all desolate and void.

Oh signet-ring! with which the Almighty seal'd
His treaty with the remnant of the clay
That shrank before him, to remotest time
Stamp wisdom on the souls that turn to thee.
Sublime Instructor! who four thousand years
Hast ne'er withheld thy lesson, but unfurl'd,
As shower and sunbeam bade, thy glorious scroll,
Oft, mid the summer's day, I musing sit
At my lone casement, to be taught of thee.
Born of the tear-drop and the smile, methinks,
Thou hast affinity with man, for such
His elements and pilgrimage below.
Our span of strength and beauty fades like thine,
Yet stays its fabric on eternal truth
And boundless mercy.
The wild floods may come,
The everlasting fountains burst their bounds,
The exploring dove without a leaf return,
Yea, the fires glow that melt the solid rock,
And earth be wreck'd: What then? Be still, my soul;
Enter thine ark; God's promise cannot fail;
For surely as yon rainbow tints the cloud,
His truth, thine Ararat, will shelter thee.