Who painteth the shadows that are beneath The wide-winding caves of the peopled tomb? Or uniteth the hopes of what shall be With the fears and the love for that which we see? HE wind has swept from the wide atmosphere Each vapour that obscured the And pallid evening twines its beaming hair day: Silence and twilight, unbeloved of men, Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen. They breathe their spells towards the depart ing day, Encompassing the earth, air, stars, and sea; Light, sound, and motion own the potent sway, Responding to the charm with its own mystery. The winds are still, or the dry church-tower grass Knows not their gentle motions as they pass. Thou too, aërial Pile! whose pinnacles Around whose lessening and invisible height The dead are sleeping in their sepulchres: sound Half sense, half thought, among the darkness stirs, Breathed from their wormy beds all living things around, And mingling with the still night and r sky Its awful hush is felt inaudibly. Thus solemnized and softened, death is mi Sweet secrets, or beside its breathless sleep That loveliest dreams perpetual watch keep. H! there are spirits of the air, fair As star-beams among twilight trees :Such lovely ministers to meet Oft hast thou turned from men thy lonely feet. With mountain winds, and babbling springs, And moonlight seas, that are the voice Of these inexplicable things Thou didst hold commune, and rejoice When they did answer thee; but they |