SILVER SPRING
Virgin! when the shadows roll
To the ice-embattled pole,
From thy sweet, pellucid soul—
Each angelic host on high
Sees in that cerulian eye
Blossom-beauties of the sky.
Blessed spirits! ye who dwell
Far beyond the ether swell,
How ye anthem, “It is well!”
On thy bosom let me seem
Kerneled in a Bagdad dream,
Rocked to slumber by a Seraph over thy celestial stream!
On a fairy, pensive pinion
Gloat I o’er thy deep dominion,
Shaming e’en the Augustinian;
Wonders rushing thicker—faster!
Here a porphyry pilaster,
Here a temple alabaster;
And the sunshine as it falls
Splinters on quintillion halls,
And a miracle of walls!
Now thy bannerets are beaming—
Now with mystic music gleaming
O’er a city—gem-girt city—in a gush of dervish dreaming!
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