Chapter LXXI: Sonnets

CHARLES HEAVYSEGE.--1816-1876.

I.

The day was lingering in the pale north-west,
And night was hanging o'er my head,--
Night where a myriad stars were spread;
While down in the east, where the light was least,
Seem'd the home of the quiet dead.
And, as I gazed on the field sublime,
To watch the bright, pulsating stars,
Adown the deep where the angels sleep
Came drawn the golden chime
Of those great spheres that sound the years
For the horologe of time.
Millenniums numberless they told,
Millenniums a million-fold
From the ancient hour of prime.

II.

The stars are glittering in the frosty sky,
Frequent as pebbles on a broad sea-coast;
And o'er the vault the cloud-like galaxy
Has marshall'd its innumerable host.
Alive all heaven seems! with wondrous glow
Tenfold refulgent every star appears,
As if some wide, celestial gale did blow,
And thrice illume the ever-kindled spheres.
Orbs, with glad orbs rejoicing, burning, beam,
Ray-crown'd, with lambent lustre in their zones,
Till o'er the blue, bespangled spaces seem
Angels and great archangels on their thrones;
A host divine, whose eyes are sparkling gems,
And forms more bright than diamond diadems.

III.

Hush'd in a calm beyond mine utterance,
See in the western sky the evening spread;
Suspended in its pale, serene expanse,
Like scatter'd flames, the glowing cloudlets red.
Clear are those clouds; and that pure sky's profound,
Transparent as a lake of hyaline;
Nor motion, nor the faintest breath of sound,
Disturbs the steadfast beauty of the scene.
Far o'er the vault, the winnow'd welkin wide,
From the bronzed east unto the whiten'd west,
Moor'd, seem, in their sweet, tranquil, roseate pride,
Those clouds the fabled islands of the blest;--
The lands where pious spirits breathe in joy,
And love and worship all their hours employ.