The sad mysterious voices of the night,
Bathing the soul in reverie and love;
The low wind, whispering of its former might
To the tall trees that sigh the hills above,
Like angel-tones that roll from sphere to sphere
And dimly echo to the faithful ear;
The flitting shadows glancing o'er the sail
Of some proud ship that's dreaming on the sea;
The lighthouse fires that fitful glow and pale;
The far-off strains of martial minstrelsy;
Wechawken's hoary head o'er hill and dell,
Gloomy and proud, a giant sentinel;
Such the soft charms, thou Paradise of Death!
My languid spirit hath erewhile confest,
When wearied with the city's tainted breath,
Fever'd and faint I've sought thy shades of rest,
Where all combines in heaven, and earth, and sea,
To image life, death, immortality!—
Here where the dusky savage twanged his bow
In the old time at startled doe or fawn,
Raised the shrill war-whoop at the approach of foe,
His wild eye flashing with revenge and scorn;
Here where the Indian maiden told her love
To the soft sighing spirits of the grove.
Here, where the bloody fiend of frantic war
Flapped its red wings o'er hill-top and o'er plain—
Where the sharp musket ring, and cannon roar,
Crashed o'er the valley, thundered o'er the main,
No sound is heard, save the sweet symphony
Of Nature's all-pervading harmony.
Here the pale willow, drooping o'er the wave,
Dips its long tresses in the silvery flood;
Here the blue violet, blooming o'er the grave,
Distils its fragrance to the enamored wood,
While the complaining turtle's mournful woe
Steals on the ear in murmurs soft and low.
Here its cold shaft the polished marble rears;
Here, eloquent of grief, the sculptured urn
Bares its white bosom to the dewy tears,
Dropt pure from heaven, far purer to return!
Here the grim granite's sempeternal pile
In monumental grandeur stands the while.
Where the still stars with gentlest radiance shine
On forest green and flower-enamelled vale,
Two simple columns circled by one vine,
Tell to the traveller's eye the tender tale
Of constancy in life and death—and love,
Not e'en the horrors of the tomb could move.
Here strained, and struggling with the unequal might
Of sea and tempest, the poor foundering bark,
And the snapp'd cable, chiselled on yon height,
Where calmly sleeps the wave-tossed pilot mark;
Hope, with her anchor, pointing to the sky,
Triumphant hails the spirit flight on high!
Hark! how the solemn spirit dirge ascends
In floating cadence on the evening air,
Where with clasped hands the weeping angel bends
In human grief o'er her that's buried there;
The gentle maid, in festive garments hurled
From life's gay glitter to the gloomy world!