Where Avalanches Wail
Where avalanches wail, and green Distress
Sweeps o’er the pallid beak of loveliness:
Where melancholy Sulphur holds her sway:
And cliffs of conscience tremble and obey;
And where Tartarean rattle snakes expire;
Twisting like tendrils of a hero’s pyre?
No! dancing in the meteor’s hall of power,
See, Genius ponders o’er Affection’s tower!
A form of thund’ring import soars on high,
Hark! ’tis the gore of infant melody:
No more shall verdant Innocence amuse
The lips that death-fraught Indignation glues;—
Tempests shall teach the trackless tide of thought.
That undiminish’d senselessness is naught;
Freedom shall glare; and oh! ye links divine,
The Poet’s heart shall quiver in the brine.
Anonymous