AN APPEAL TO THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC 139
All the gold gates are open of the East ;
The rugged columns of the hills uphold
A dome of changeless turquoise, and they
feast,
The sun’s lips, on the woods that have in-
creased
Since dawn with store of unimagined gold.
The steam of many exhalations fair
Sweetens the midday air ;
Echo and tree and bud chant and give birth
and bear.
The broad Pacific brightens into blue,
And coral isles are white with beating
flame
Of living water on their strand, live through
With million flames candescent as the dew,
Red flowers too queenly for a mortal name !
The sea is pregnant with green stars; the
land,
The sky, like lovers stand
With kiss half-consciously exchanged, hand
fast in hand.
O lovers fair and free, the wings of peace
Bear this voice onward ; linger as you will
By moon-wrought glades, and softly mur-
muring seas,
Lands white with summer, and the guiet
leas !
Linger, and let no word of music thrill
Your hearts; young love is all the harp ye
need :
Your kiss in very deed
Is keen to echo song well tuned from
Milton’s reed.
O lovers, and ye happy groves that hear
Their whispers, and ye vales that know
their feet,
And all ye mountains that incline your ear
To the still murmur of the love-lorn sphere,
And all ye caves their murmurs who
repeat;
Your music throbs in unison with mine ;
The world is flushed with wine
Bubbling from Freedom’s well, warm,
luminous, divine.
Burn, changeful purple of the vine’s cool
stream !
Burn, like the sunset ofa stormy sky
When white winds gather, and white horses
gleam
Upon the ocean, and the meadows steam
With haze of thunder, when the crimson
eye
Dips, and deep darkness falls and lies, and
breaks
In hghtning’s awful flakes,
When thunder unto thunder calls and the
storm awakes.
With maddening hoofs, ye coursers of the
sun,
Spurn the reverberant air and paw the day,
Make east and west indissolubly one,
And night fall beaten, for its day is spun,
And bid light gird its sword to thigh, dis-
play )
The shield of heaven’s blue, and call the deep
To watch the warrior sleep
Of two fast friends that wake only if brave
men weep.
Wake, western land so fair, and this shall be!
Speak and accomplish, let no ardour slip,
A sullen hound, and be brought shamefully
Back, and resurge the tremor of the sea,
And spoil a perfect kiss from free land’s lip.
O fair free sister country, for our sake, |
Who at thy side would break
All bars, all bonds, and bid the very dead
awake.
Are not your veins made purple with our
blood,
And our dominions touch they not afield?
Pours not the sea its long exultant flood
On either’s coast? The rose has one same
bud,
And the vine’s heart one purple pledge
doth yield.
Are we not weary of the fangéd pen?
Are we not friends, and men?
Le us look frankly face to face—and quarrel
then !