A SUMMER SUNRISE

The master-hand whose pencils trace

This wondrous landscape of the morn,

Is but the sun, whose glowing face

Reflects the rapture and the grace

Of inspiration Heaven-born.

And yet with vision-dazzled eyes,

I see the lotus-lands of old,

Where odorous breezes fall and rise,

And mountains, peering in the skies,

Stand ankle-deep in lakes of gold.

And, spangled with the shine and shade,

I see the rivers raveled out

In strands of silver, slowly fade

In threads of light along the glade

Where truant roses hide and pout.

The tamarind on gleaming sands

Droops drowsily beneath the heat;

And bowed as though aweary, stands

The stately palm, with lazy hands

That fold their shadows round his feet.

And mistily, as through a veil,

I catch the glances of a sea

Of sapphire, dimpled with a gale

Toward Colch's blowing, where the sail

Of Jason's Argo beckons me.

And gazing on and farther yet,

I see the isles enchanted, bright

With fretted spire and parapet,

And gilded mosque and minaret,

That glitter in the crimson light.

But as I gaze, the city's walls

Are keenly smitten with a gleam

Of pallid splendor, that appalls

The fancy as the ruin falls

In ashen embers of a dream.

Yet over all the waking earth

The tears of night are brushed away,

And eyes are lit with love and mirth,

And benisons of richest worth

Go up to bless the new-born day.