Time, A Poem Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

Rhyme Scheme: ABACDEFGHIJKLMNO PKQKRMMSKTUV WXLYKKZA2B2IC2IID2E2 F2C2IIIC2I IG2IIH2TI2J2K2L2M2N2 KIO2KRAKP2Q2R2RL2ID2 LIIIK QS2LQ2T2L2IK2KQ2 U2V2KLC2IIW2X2Y2Z2A3 IIIKIKIB3C3IC3T D3C3IC3C3IE3IIC3C3F3 IC3G3IIIH3W2 C3III3KJ3I3II3C3IC3I S2K2K3I L3C3IK2C3I3IK2IIC3M3 IK2IIC3C3C3A2C3N3IT2 I2IW2KI O3IO3IC3IC3C3IP3C3I3 KC3D Q3IC3C3R3KS2IIILS3C3 KIIIC3IK IIIIKIKIIC3C3T3IK C3U3C3IIIIKK2C3C3C3K 2IC3 Y2G2LAKC3C3C3V3W3LIK IX3D3C3D3C3C3C3KC3OY 3C3IC3Z3IKA IA4KK2AIIB4KC3 KC3IC3B4IC3B4C3C3LC3 C3KC3C3 IC3K2IC4C3KW2C3IIC3I I2IIC3X3ILIC3C3D4IE4 S2AK2KW2IIIIIA2F4C3K 2C3IC3TE4IIC3C3C3K2C 3C3IC3C3C3IC3G4K3W2D 3IH4I4C3C3C3IC3C3IKJ 4 IW2W2LC3S2C3C3KK4C3I C3C3B4KIS2IIL4C3K2IX 3 IE3K2IILM4IC3I N4O4L4IKC3IP4X3Y3III C3TIC3IP4Q4C3C3C3I4I C3C3O4C3C3C3C3C3IK C3C3IIIKC3C3C3C3IC3K 2IKKK2P4K2 KW2C3IKIW2C3C3R4F4IC 3E3C3K2C3C3K2IW2K2KS 4K2X3C3KC3IKK2E3KKW2 C3K2C3KC3W2KW2C3KKIT 4D3IKC3K U4C3C3C3IIC3C3KT2KW2 C3C3TW2V4T3IC3IIIK2W 4C3B4X4 IKP3Y4IW2K2IC3K2C3 W2C3C3W2K2Z4IFW2OC3K 2IK2IIIC3KK2II W2B4KW2W2IC3IC3IIKC3 IIY4 KC3IP3E3W2KC3KK2K2C3 C3I IKW2H4IKIK2OIIIKW2

Genius of musings who the midnight hour	A
Wasting in woods or haunted forests wild	B
Dost watch Orion in his arctic tower	A
Thy dark eye fix'd as in some holy trance	C
Or when the vollied lightnings cleave the air	D
And Ruin gaunt bestrides the winged storm	E
Sitt'st in some lonely watchtower where thy lamp	F
Faint blazing strikes the fisher's eye from far	G
And 'mid the howl of elements unmoved	H
Dost ponder on the awful scene and trace	I
The vast effect to its superior source	J
Spirit attend my lowly benison	K
For now I strike to themes of import high	L
The solitary lyre and borne by thee	M
Above this narrow cell I celebrate	N
The mysteries of Time	O
	-
Him who august	P
Was e'er these worlds were fashion'd ere the sun	K
Sprang from the east or Lucifer display'd	Q
His glowing cresset in the arch of morn	K
Or Vesper gilded the serener eve	R
Yea He had been for an eternity	M
Had swept unvarying from eternity	M
The harp of desolation ere his tones	S
At God's command assumed a milder strain	K
And startled on his watch in the vast deep	T
Chaos's sluggish sentry and evoked	U
From the dark void the smiling universe	V
	-
Chain'd to the groveling frailties of the flesh	W
Mere mortal man unpurged from earthly dross	X
Cannot survey with fix'd and steady eye	L
The dim uncertain gulf which now the muse	Y
Adventurous would explore but dizzy grown	K
He topples down the abyss If he would scan	K
The fearful chasm and catch a transient glimpse	Z
Of its unfathomable depths that so	A2
His mind may turn with double joy to God	B2
His only certainty and resting place	I
He must put off awhile this mortal vest	C2
And learn to follow without giddiness	I
To heights where all is vision and surprise	I
And vague conjecture He must waste by night	D2
The studious taper far from all resort	E2
Of crowds and folly in some still retreat	F2
High on the beetling promontory's crest	C2
Or in the caves of the vast wilderness	I
Where compass'd round with Nature's wildest shapes	I
He may be driven to centre all his thoughts	I
In the great Architect who lives confess'd	C2
In rocks and seas and solitary wastes	I
	-
So has divine Philosophy with voice	I
Mild as the murmurs of the moonlight wave	G2
Tutor'd the heart of him who now awakes	I
Touching the chords of solemn minstrelsy	I
His faint neglected song intent to snatch	H2
Some vagrant blossom from the dangerous steep	T
Of poesy a bloom of such a hue	I2
So sober as may not unseemly suit	J2
With Truth's severer brow and one withal	K2
So hardy as shall brave the passing wind	L2
Of many winters rearing its meek head	M2
In loveliness when he who gathered it	N2
Is number'd with the generations gone	K
Yet not to me hath God's good providence	I
Given studious leisure or unbroken thought	O2
Such as he owns a meditative man	K
Who from the blush of morn to quiet eve	R
Ponders or turns the page of wisdom o'er	A
Far from the busy crowd's tumultuous din	K
From noise and wrangling far and undisturb'd	P2
With Mirth's unholy shouts For me the day	Q2
Hath duties which require the vigorous hand	R2
Of steadfast application but which leave	R
No deep improving trace upon the mind	L2
But be the day another's let it pass	I
The night's my own They cannot steal my night	D2
When evening lights her folding star on high	L
I live and breathe and in the sacred hours	I
Of quiet and repose my spirit flies	I
Free as the morning o'er the realms of space	I
And mounts the skies and imps her wing for Heaven	K
	-
Hence do I love the sober suited maid	Q
Hence Night's my friend my mistress and my theme	S2
And she shall aid me now to magnify	L
The night of ages now when the pale ray	Q2
Of starlight penetrates the studious gloom	T2
And at my window seated while mankind	L2
Are lock'd in sleep I feel the freshening breeze	I
Of stillness blow while in her saddest stole	K2
Thought like a wakeful vestal at her shrine	K
Assumes her wonted sway	Q2
	-
Behold the world	U2
Rests and her tired inhabitants have paused	V2
From trouble and turmoil The widow now	K
Has ceased to weep and her twin orphans lie	L
Lock'd in each arm partakers of her rest	C2
The man of sorrow has forgot his woes	I
The outcast that his head is shelterless	I
His griefs unshared The mother tends no more	W2
Her daughter's dying slumbers but surprised	X2
With heaviness and sunk upon her couch	Y2
Dreams of her bridals Even the hectic lull'd	Z2
On Death's lean arm to rest in visions wrapp'd	A3
Crowning with Hope's bland wreath his shuddering nurse	I
Poor victim smiles Silence and deep repose	I
Reign o'er the nations and the warning voice	I
Of Nature utters audibly within	K
The general moral tells us that repose	I
Deathlike as this but of far longer span	K
Is coming on us that the weary crowds	I
Who now enjoy a temporary calm	B3
Shall soon taste lasting quiet wrapp'd around	C3
With grave clothes and their aching restless heads	I
Mouldering in holes and corners unobserved	C3
Till the last trump shall break their sullen sleep	T
	-
Who needs a teacher to admonish him	D3
That flesh is grass that earthly things are mist	C3
What are our joys but dreams and what our hopes	I
But goodly shadows in the summer cloud	C3
There's not a wind that blows but bears with it	C3
Some rainbow promise Not a moment flies	I
But puts its sickle in the fields of life	E3
And mows its thousands with their joys and cares	I
'T is but as yesterday since on yon stars	I
Which now I view the Chaldee shepherd gazed	C3
In his mid watch observant and disposed	C3
The twinkling hosts as fancy gave them shape	F3
Yet in the interim what mighty shocks	I
Have buffeted mankind whole nations razed	C3
Cities made desolate the polish'd sunk	G3
To barbarism and once barbaric states	I
Swaying the wand of science and of arts	I
Illustrious deeds and memorable names	I
Blotted from record and upon the tongue	H3
Of gray Tradition voluble no more	W2
	-
Where are the heroes of the ages past	C3
Where the brave chieftains where the mighty ones	I
Who flourish'd in the infancy of days	I
All to the grave gone down On their fallen fame	I3
Exultant mocking at the pride of man	K
Sits grim Forgetfulness The warrior's arm	J3
Lies nerveless on the pillow of its shame	I3
Hush'd is his stormy voice and quench'd the blaze	I
Of his red eyeball Yesterday his name	I3
Was mighty on the earth To day 't is what	C3
The meteor of the night of distant years	I
That flash'd unnoticed save by wrinkled eld	C3
Musing at midnight upon prophecies	I
Who at her lonely lattice saw the gleam	S2
Point to the mist poised shroud then quietly	K2
Closed her pale lips and lock'd the secret up	K3
Safe in the enamel's treasures	I
	-
Oh how weak	L3
Is mortal man how trifling how confined	C3
His scope of vision Puff'd with confidence	I
His phrase grows big with immortality	K2
And he poor insect of a summer's day	C3
Dreams of eternal honours to his name	I3
Of endless glory and perennial bays	I
He idly reasons of eternity	K2
As of the train of ages when alas	I
Ten thousand thousand of his centuries	I
Are in comparison a little point	C3
Too trivial for account O it is strange	M3
'Tis passing strange to mark his fallacies	I
Behold him proudly view some pompous pile	K2
Whose high dome swells to emulate the skies	I
And smile and say My name shall live with this	I
Till time shall be no more while at his feet	C3
Yea at his very feet the crumbling dust	C3
Of the fallen fabric of the other day	C3
Preaches the solemn lesson He should know	A2
That time must conquer that the loudest blast	C3
That ever fill'd Renown's obstreperous trump	N3
Fades in the lapse of ages and expires	I
Who lies inhumed in the terrific gloom	T2
Of the gigantic pyramid or who	I2
Rear'd its huge walls Oblivion laughs and says	I
The prey is mine They sleep and never more	W2
Their names shall strike upon the ear of man	K
Their memory burst its fetters	I
	-
Where is Rome	O3
She lives but in the tale of other times	I
Her proud pavilions are the hermit's home	O3
And her long colonnades her public walks	I
Now faintly echo to the pilgrim's feet	C3
Who comes to muse in solitude and trace	I
Through the rank moss reveal'd her honour'd dust	C3
But not to Rome alone has fate confined	C3
The doom of ruin cities numberless	I
Tyre Sidon Carthage Babylon and Troy	P3
And rich Phoenicia they are blotted out	C3
Half razed from memory and their very name	I3
And being in dispute Has Athens fallen	K
Is polish'd Greece become the savage seat	C3
Of ignorance and sloth and shall we dare	D
	-
	-
	-
And empire seeks another hemisphere	Q3
Where now is Britain Where her laurel'd names	I
Her palaces and halls Dash'd in the dust	C3
Some second Vandal hath reduced her pride	C3
And with one big recoil hath thrown her back	R3
To primitive barbarity Again	K
Through her depopulated vales the scream	S2
Of bloody Superstition hollow rings	I
And the scared native to the tempest howls	I
The yell of deprecation O'er her marts	I
Her crowded ports broods Silence and the cry	L
Of the low curlew and the pensive dash	S3
Of distant billows breaks alone the void	C3
Even as the savage sits upon the stone	K
That marks where stood her capitols and hears	I
The bittern booming in the weeds he shrinks	I
From the dismaying solitude Her bards	I
Sing in a language that hath perished	C3
And their wild harps suspended o'er their graves	I
Sigh to the desert winds a dying strain	K
	-
Meanwhile the Arts in second infancy	I
Rise in some distant clime and then perchance	I
Some bold adventurer fill'd with golden dreams	I
Steering his bark through trackless solitudes	I
Where to his wandering thoughts no daring prow	K
Hath ever ploughed before espies the cliffs	I
Of fallen Albion To the land unknown	K
He journeys joyful and perhaps descries	I
Some vestige of her ancient stateliness	I
Then he with vain conjecture fills his mind	C3
Of the unheard of race which had arrived	C3
At science in that solitary nook	T3
Far from the civil world and sagely sighs	I
And moralizes on the state of man	K
	-
Still on its march unnoticed and unfelt	C3
Moves on our being We do live and breathe	U3
And we are gone The spoiler heeds us not	C3
We have our springtime and our rottenness	I
And as we fall another race succeeds	I
To perish likewise Meanwhile Nature smiles	I
The seasons run their round The Sun fulfils	I
His annual course and heaven and earth remain	K
Still changing yet unchanged still doom'd to feel	K2
Endless mutation in perpetual rest	C3
Where are conceal'd the days which have elapsed	C3
Hid in the mighty cavern of the past	C3
They rise upon us only to appall	K2
By indistinct and half glimpsed images	I
Misty gigantic huge obscure remote	C3
	-
Oh it is fearful on the midnight couch	Y2
When the rude rushing winds forget to rave	G2
And the pale moon that through the casement high	L
Surveys the sleepless muser stamps the hour	A
Of utter silence it is fearful then	K
To steer the mind in deadly solitude	C3
Up the vague stream of probability	C3
To wind the mighty secrets of the past	C3
And turn the key of time Oh who can strive	V3
To comprehend the vast the awful truth	W3
Of the eternity that hath gone by	L
And not recoil from the dismaying sense	I
Of human impotence The life of man	K
Is summ'd in birthdays and in sepulchres	I
But the Eternal God had no beginning	X3
He hath no end Time had been with him	D3
For everlasting ere the dredal world	C3
Rose from the gulf in loveliness Like him	D3
It knew no source like him 't was uncreate	C3
What is it then The past Eternity	C3
We comprehend a future without end	C3
We feel it possible that even yon sun	K
May roll for ever but we shrink amazed	C3
We stand aghast when we reflect that time	O
Knew no commencement That heap age on age	Y3
And million upon million without end	C3
And we shall never span the void of days	I
That were and are not but in retrospect	C3
The Past is an unfathomable depth	Z3
Beyond the span of thought 'tis an elapse	I
Which hath no mensuration but hath been	K
For ever and for ever	A
	-
Change of days	I
To us is sensible and each revolve	A4
Of the recording sun conducts us on	K
Further in life and nearer to our goal	K2
Not so with Time mysterious chronicler	A
He knoweth not mutation centuries	I
Are to his being as a day and days	I
As centuries Time past and Time to come	B4
Are always equal when the world began	K
God had existed from eternity	C3
	-
	-
	-
Now look on man	K
Myriads of ages hence Hath time elapsed	C3
Is he not standing in the selfsame place	I
Where once we stood The same eternity	C3
Hath gone before him and is yet to come	B4
His past is not of longer span than ours	I
Though myriads of ages intervened	C3
For who can add to what has neither sum	B4
Nor bound nor source nor estimate nor end	C3
Oh who can compass the Almighty mind	C3
Who can unlock the secrets of the high	L
In speculations of an altitude	C3
Sublime as this our reason stands confess'd	C3
Foolish and insignificant and mean	K
Who can apply the futile argument	C3
Of finite beings to infinity	C3
	-
He might as well compress the universe	I
Into the hollow compass of a gourd	C3
Scoop'd out by human art or bid the whale	K2
Drink up the sea it swims in Can the less	I
Contain the greater or the dark obscure	C4
Infold the glories of meridian day	C3
What does philosophy impart to man	K
But undiscovered wonders Let her soar	W2
Even to her proudest heights to where she caught	C3
The soul of Newton and of Socrates	I
She but extends the scope of wild amaze	I
And admiration All her lessons end	C3
In wider views of God's unfathom'd depths	I
	-
Lo the unletter'd hind who never knew	I2
To raise his mind excursive to the heights	I
Of abstract contemplation as he sits	I
On the green hillock by the hedge row side	C3
What time the insect swarms are murmuring	X3
And marks in silent thought the broken clouds	I
That fringe with loveliest hues the evening sky	L
Feels in his soul the hand of Nature rouse	I
The thrill of gratitude to him who form'd	C3
The goodly prospect he beholds the God	C3
Throned in the west and his reposing ear	D4
Hears sounds angelic in the fitful breeze	I
That floats through neighbouring copse or fairy brake	E4
Or lingers playful on the haunted stream	S2
Go with the cotter to his winter fire	A
Where o'er the moors the loud blast whistles shrill	K2
And the hoarse ban dog bays the icy moon	K
Mark with what awe he lists the wild uproar	W2
Silent and big with thought and hear him bless	I
The God that rides on the tempestuous clouds	I
For his snug hearth and all his little joys	I
Hear him compare his happier lot with his	I
Who bends his way across the wintry wolds	I
A poor night traveller while the dismal snow	A2
Beats in his face and dubious of his path	F4
He stops and thinks in every lengthening blast	C3
He hears some village mastiff's distant howl	K2
And sees far streaming some lone cottage light	C3
Then undeceived upturns his streaming eyes	I
And clasps his shivering hands or overpowered	C3
Sinks on the frozen ground weigh'd down with sleep	T
From which the hapless wretch shall never wake	E4
Thus the poor rustic warms his heart with praise	I
And glowing gratitude he turns to bless	I
With honest warmth his Maker and his God	C3
And shall it e'er be said that a poor hind	C3
Nursed in the lap of Ignorance and bred	C3
In want and labour glows with nobler zeal	K2
To laud his Maker's attributes while he	C3
Whom starry Science in her cradle rock'd	C3
And Castaly enchasten'd with his dews	I
Closes his eyes upon the holy word	C3
And blind to all but arrogance and pride	C3
Dares to declare his infidelity	C3
And openly contemn the Lord of Hosts	I
What is philosophy if it impart	C3
Irreverence for the Deity or teach	G4
A mortal man to set his judgment up	K3
Against his Maker's will The Polygar	W2
Who kneels to sun or moon compared with him	D3
Who thus perverts the talents he enjoys	I
Is the most bless'd of men Oh I would walk	H4
A weary journey to the furthest verge	I4
Of the big world to kiss that good man's hand	C3
Who in the blaze of wisdom and of art	C3
Preserves a lowly mind and to his God	C3
Feeling the sense of his own littleness	I
Is as a child in meek simplicity	C3
What is the pomp of learning the parade	C3
Of letters and of tongues e'en as the mists	I
Of the gray morn before the rising sun	K
That pass away and perish	J4
	-
Earthly things	I
Are but the transient pageants of an hour	W2
And earthly pride is like the passing flower	W2
That springs to fall and blossoms but to die	L
'T is as the tower erected on a cloud	C3
Baseless and silly as the schoolboy's dream	S2
Ages and epochs that destroy our pride	C3
And then record its downfall what are they	C3
But the poor creatures of man's teeming brain	K
Hath Heaven its ages or doth Heaven preserve	K4
Its stated eras Doth the Omnipotent	C3
Hear of to morrows or of yesterdays	I
There is to God nor future nor a past	C3
Throned in his might all times to him are present	C3
He hath no lapse no past no time to come	B4
He sees before him one eternal now	K
Time moveth not our being 't is that moves	I
And we swift gliding down life's rapid stream	S2
Dream of swift ages and revolving years	I
Ordain'd to chronicle our passing days	I
So the young sailor in the gallant bark	L4
Scudding before the wind beholds the coast	C3
Receding from his eyes and thinks the while	K2
Struck with amaze that he is motionless	I
And that the land is sailing	X3
	-
Such alas	I
Are the illusions of this proteus life	E3
All all is false through every phasis still	K2
'T is shadowy and deceitful It assumes	I
The semblances of things and specious shapes	I
But the lost traveller might as soon rely	L
On the evasive spirit of the marsh	M4
Whose lantern beams and vanishes and flits	I
O'er bog and rock and pit and hollow way	C3
As we on its appearances	I
	-
On earth	N4
There is no certainty nor stable hope	O4
As well the weary mariner whose bark	L4
Is toss'd beyond Cimmerian Bosphorus	I
Where storm and darkness hold their drear domain	K
And sunbeams never penetrate might trust	C3
To expectation of serener skies	I
And linger in the very jaws of death	P4
Because some peevish cloud were opening	X3
Or the loud storm had bated in its rage	Y3
As we look forward in this vale of tears	I
To permanent delight from some slight glimpse	I
Of shadowy unsubstantial happiness	I
	-
The good man's hope is laid far far beyond	C3
The sway of tempests or the furious sweep	T
Of mortal desolation He beholds	I
Unapprehensive the gigantic stride	C3
Of rampant Ruin or the unstable waves	I
Of dark Vicissitude Even in death	P4
In that dread hour when with a giant pang	Q4
Tearing the tender fibres of the heart	C3
The immortal spirit struggles to be free	C3
Then even then that hope forsakes him not	C3
For it exists beyond the narrow verge	I4
Of the cold sepulchre The petty joys	I
Of fleeting life indignantly it spurn'd	C3
And rested on the bosom of its God	C3
This is man's only reasonable hope	O4
And 't is a hope which cherish'd in the breast	C3
Shall not be disappointed Even he	C3
The Holy One Almighty who elanced	C3
The rolling world along its airy way	C3
Even He will deign to smile upon the good	C3
And welcome him to these celestial seats	I
Where joy and gladness hold their changeless reign	K
	-
Thou proud man look upon yon starry vault	C3
Survey the countless gems which richly stud	C3
The night's imperial chariot Telescopes	I
Will show thee myriads more innumerous	I
Than the sea sand each of those little lamps	I
Is the great source of light the central sun	K
Round which some other mighty sisterhood	C3
Of planets travel every planet stock'd	C3
With Hying beings impotent as thee	C3
Now proud man now where is thy greatness fled	C3
What art thou in the scale of universe	I
Less less than nothing Yet of thee the God	C3
Who built this wondrous frame of worlds is careful	K2
As well as of the mendicant who begs	I
The leavings of thy table And shalt thou	K
Lift up thy thankless spirit and contemn	K
His heavenly providence Deluded fool	K2
Even now the thunderbolt is wing'd with death	P4
Even now thou totterest on the brink of hell	K2
	-
How insignificant is mortal man	K
Bound to the hasty pinions of an hour	W2
How poor how trivial in the vast conceit	C3
Of infinite duration boundless space	I
God of the universe Almighty One	K
Thou who dost walk upon the winged winds	I
Or with the storm thy rugged charioteer	W2
Swift and impetuous as the northern blast	C3
Ridest from pole to pole Thou who dost hold	C3
The forked lightnings in thine awful grasp	R4
And reignest in the earthquake when thy wrath	F4
Goes down towards erring man I would address	I
To thee my parting p an for of Thee	C3
Great beyond comprehension who thyself	E3
Art Time and Space sublime Infinitude	C3
Of Thee has been my song With awe I kneel	K2
Trembling before the footstool of thy state	C3
My God my Father I will sing to thee	C3
A hymn of laud a solemn canticle	K2
Ere on the cypress wreath which overshades	I
The throne of Death I hang my mournful lyre	W2
And give its wild strings to the desert gale	K2
Rise Son of Salem rise and join the strain	K
Sweep to accordant tones thy tuneful harp	S4
And leaving vain laments arouse thy soul	K2
To exultation Sing hosanna sing	X3
And halleluiah for the Lord is great	C3
And full of mercy He has thought of man	K
Yea compass'd round with countless worlds has thought	C3
Of us poor worms that batten in the dews	I
Of morn and perish ere the noonday sun	K
Sing to the Lord for he is merciful	K2
He gave the Nubian lion but to live	E3
To rage its hour and perish but on man	K
He lavish'd immortality and Heaven	K
The eagle falls from her a euml rial tower	W2
And mingles with irrevocable dust	C3
But man from death springs joyful	K2
Springs up to life and to eternity	C3
Oh that insensate of the favouring boon	K
The great exclusive privilege bestow'd	C3
On us unworthy trifles men should dare	W2
To treat with slight regard the proffer'd Heaven	K
And urge the lenient but All Just to swear	W2
In wrath They shall not enter in my rest	C3
Might I address the supplicative strain	K
To thy high footstool I would pray that thou	K
Wouldst pity the deluded wanderers	I
And fold them ere they perish in thy flock	T4
Yea I would bid thee pity them through Him	D3
Thy well beloved who upon the cross	I
Bled a dread sacrifice for human sin	K
And paid with bitter agony the debt	C3
Of primitive transgression	K
	-
Oh I shrink	U4
My very soul doth shrink when I reflect	C3
That the time hastens when in vengeance clothed	C3
Thou shalt come down to stamp the seal of fate	C3
On erring mortal man Thy chariot wheels	I
Then shall rebound to earth's remotest caves	I
And stormy Ocean from his bed shall start	C3
At the appalling summons Oh I how dread	C3
On the dark eye of miserable man	K
Chasing his sins in secrecy and gloom	T2
Will burst the effulgence of the opening Heaven	K
When to the brazen trumpet's deafening roar	W2
Thou and thy dazzling cohorts shall descend	C3
Proclaiming the fulfilment of the word	C3
The dead shall start astonish'd from their sleep	T
The sepulchres shall groan and yield their prey	W2
The bellowing floods shall disembogue their charge	V4
Of human victims From the farthest nook	T3
Of the wide world shall troop the risen souls	I
From him whose bones are bleaching in the waste	C3
Of polar solitudes or him whose corpse	I
Whelm'd in the loud Atlantic's vexed tides	I
Is wash'd on some Caribbean prominence	I
To the lone tenant of some secret cell	K2
In the Pacific's vast realm	W4
Where never plummet's sound was heard to part	C3
The wilderness of water they shall come	B4
To greet the solemn advent of the Judge	X4
	-
Thou first shalt summon the elected saints	I
To their apportion'd Heaven and thy Son	K
At thy right hand shall smile with conscious joy	P3
On all his past distresses when for them	Y4
He bore humanity's severest pangs	I
Then shalt thou seize the avenging scimitar	W2
And with a roar as loud and horrible	K2
As the stern earthquake's monitory voice	I
The wicked shall be driven to their abode	C3
Down the immitigable gulf to wail	K2
And gnash their teeth in endless agony	C3
	-
	-
	-
Rear thou aloft thy standard Spirit rear	W2
Thy flag on high Invincible and throned	C3
In unparticipated might Behold	C3
Earth's proudest boasts beneath thy silent sway	W2
Sweep headlong to destruction thou the while	K2
Unmoved and heedless thou dost hear the rush	Z4
Of mighty generations as they pass	I
To the broad gulf of ruin and dost stamp	F
Thy signet on them and they rise no more	W2
Who shall contend with Time unvanquish'd Time	O
The conqueror of conquerors and lord	C3
Of desolation Lo the shadows fly	K2
The hours and days and years and centuries	I
They fly they fly and nations rise and fall	K2
The young are old the old are in their graves	I
Heard'st thou that shout It rent the vaulted skies	I
It was the voice of people mighty crowds	I
Again 't is hushed Time speaks and all is hush'd	C3
In the vast multitude now reigns alone	K
Unruffled solitude They all are still	K2
All yea the whole the incalculable mass	I
Still as the ground that clasps their cold remains	I
	-
Rear thou aloft thy standard Spirit rear	W2
Thy flag on high and glory in thy strength
But do thou know the season yet shall come	B4
When from its base thine adamantine throne	K
Shall tumble when thine arm shall cease to strike
Thy voice forget its petrifying power	W2
When saints shall shout and Time shall be no more	W2
Yea he doth come the mighty champion comes	I
Whose potent spear shall give thee thy death wound	C3
Shall crush the conqueror of conquerors	I
And desolate stern Desolation's lord	C3
Lo where he cometh the Messiah comes	I
The King the Comforter the Christ He comes	I
To burst the bonds of Death and overturn	K
The power of Time Hark the trumpet's blast	C3
Rings o'er the heavens They rise the myriads rise	I
Even from their graves they spring and burst the chains	I
Of torpor He has ransom'd them	Y4
	-
Forgotten generations live again	K
Assume the bodily shapes they own'd of old	C3
Beyond the flood the righteous of their times	I
Embrace and weep they weep the tears of joy	P3
The sainted mother wakes and in her lap
Clasps her dear babe the partner of her grave	E3
And heritor with her of Heaven a flower	W2
Wash'd by the blood of Jesus from the stain	K
Of native guilt even in its early bud	C3
And hark those strains how solemnly serene	K
They fall as from the skies at distance fall	K2
Again more loud the halleluiahs swell	K2
The newly risen catch the joyful sound	C3
They glow they burn and now with one accord	C3
Bursts forth sublime from every mouth the song
Of praise to God on high and to the Lamb
Who bled for mortals	I
	-
	-
	-
Yet there is peace for man Yea there is peace	I
Even in this noisy this unsettled scene	K
When from the crowd and from the city far	W2
Haply he may be set in his late walk	H4
O'ertaken with deep thought beneath the boughs	I
Of honeysuckle when the sun is gone	K
And with fix'd eye and wistful he surveys	I
The solemn shadows of the Heavens sail	K2
And thinks the season yet shall come when Time	O
Will waft him to repose to deep repose	I
Far from the unquietness of life from noise	I
And tumult far beyond the flying clouds	I
Beyond the stars and all this passing scene	K
Where change shall cease and Time shall be no more	W2

Henry Kirk White

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