The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell by James Russell Lowell
page 260 of 1368 (19%)
page 260 of 1368 (19%)
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And dwarfs our more mechanic powers.
What throbbing verse can fitly render 60 That face so pure, so trembling-tender? Sensation glimmers through its rest, It speaks unmanacled by words, As full of motion as a nest That palpitates with unfledged birds; 'Tis likest to Bethesda's stream, Forewarned through all its thrilling springs, White with the angel's coming gleam, And rippled with his fanning wings. Hear him unfold his plots and plans, 70 And larger destinies seem man's; You conjure from his glowing face The omen of a fairer race; With one grand trope he boldly spans The gulf wherein so many fall, 'Twixt possible and actual; His first swift word, talaria-shod, Exuberant with conscious God, Out of the choir of planets blots The present earth with all its spots. 80 Himself unshaken as the sky, His words, like whirlwinds, spin on high Systems and creeds pellmell together; 'Tis strange as to a deaf man's eye, While trees uprooted splinter by, |
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