The View from Castri: From a Painting by Williams

There have been bright and glorious pageants here,Where now gray stones and moss-grown columns lie;There have been words, which earth grew pale to hear,Breathed from the cavern’s misty chambers nigh:There have been voices through the sunny sky,And the pine-woods, their choral hymn-notes sending,And reeds and lyres, their Dorian melodyWith incense-clouds around the temple blending,And throngs with laurel-boughs before the altar bending.

There have been treasures of the seas and islesBrought to the Day-god’s now-forsaken throne;Thunders have peal’d along the rock-defiles,When the far-echoing battle-horn made knownThat foes were on their way! The deep wind’s moanHath chill’d th’ invader’s heart with secret fear;And from the Sibyl-grottoes, wild and lone,Storms have gone forth, which, in their fierce career,From his bold hand have struck the banner and the spear.

The shrine hath sunk!--but thou unchanged art there!Mount of the voice and vision, robed with dreams!Unchanged--and rising through the radiant air,With thy dark waving pines, and flashing streams,And all thy founts of song! Their bright course teemsWith inspiration yet; and each dim haze,Or golden cloud which floats around thee, seemsAs with its mantle veiling from our gazeThe mysteries of the past, the gods of elder days!

Away, vain fantasies!--doth less of powerDwell round thy summit, or thy cliffs invest,Though, in deep stillness, now the ruin’s flowerWave o’er the pillars mouldering on thy breast?--Lift through the free blue heavens thine arrowy crest!Let the great rocks their solitude regain!No Delphian lyres now break thy noontide restWith their full chords:--but silent be the strain!Thou hast a mightier voice to speak th’ Eternal’s reign!