Page:Poems, now first collected, Stedman, 1897.djvu/148

BYRON Yet left undimmed (her valediction sung

With Juan's smiles and tears) his natal ray

Of genius inextinguishably young,—

An Eôs through those mists proclaiming day.

How then, when to his ear came Hellas' cry,

He shred the garlands of the wild night's feast,

And rose a chief, to lead—alas, to die

And leave men mourning for that music ceased!

America! When nations for thy knell

Listened, one prophet oracled thy part:

Now, in thy morn of strength, remember well

The bard whose chant foretold thee as thou art.

Sky, mount, and forest, and high-sounding main.

The storm-cloud's vortex, splendor of the day,

Gloom of the night,—with these abide his strain,—

And these are thine, though he has passed away;

Their elemental force had roused to might

Great Nature's child in this her realm supreme,— 128