IONA

On to Iona!— What can she afford

To us save matter for a thoughtful sigh,

Heaved over ruin with stability

In urgent contrast? To diffuse the WORD

( Thy Paramount, mighty Nature! and Time's Lord )

Her Temples rose,‘ mid pagan gloom; but why,

Even for a moment, has our verse deplored

Their wrongs, since they fulfilled their destiny?

And when, subjected to a common doom

Of mutability, those far-famed Piles

Shall disappear from both the sister Isles,

Iona's Saints, forgetting not past days,

Garlands shall wear of amaranthine bloom,

While heaven's vast sea of voices chants their praise.