Where Summer's busy hand had wove
A shady roof above my head,
I sat me down and eager strove,
To spy the rebel cloud that fled.
I saw it soon, with wondering eye,
Take to itself a female form,
And hover toward me from on high,
As fall the leaves in Autumn storm.
Her dress was like the mantle fair
Which Autumn to Columbia brings,
And bids the moaning forest wear,
With rainbow hues of angel's wings;
Her voice was like the witching strain
Which laughing streamlets gayly sing
When Summer o'er the ripening grain
Spreads wide her warm and golden wing.
The rustling of her snowy wing
Was like the music of the breeze,
That seraphs mimic when they sing:
'T was sweet as when an organ's keys
Are touched by angel's hand at night,
When all the earth in slumber share,
And glimmering grave-yard meteors light
The church while spirits worship there.
Softly she spoke—"Awake! arise!
Thy doom is sealed, thou long must roam
Where ocean surges wet the skies,
And where the condor makes his home!
Thou'lt gaze on many a cloudless sky,
Where deathless Summer sweetly smiles,
Like restless swallow thou shalt fly
Where ocean's breast is gem'd with isles,
"Thy feet shall track the forests wide,
Like vast eternity unshorn,
Where great Missouri's arrowy tide
On pebbled couch is borne.
But when the World's imperial brow
Shall frown like wintry sky,
Then seek my cloud-winged bark, and thou
Shalt soar with me on high!"
She paused and vanished—but her form
In Heaven's blue lake I hail,
When oft before the raging storm
The clouds in squadron sail;
And when the fleet can live no more,
But in a mass are thrown,
On the horizon's circling shore
She skims the air alone!