Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Italy: Vols. XI–XIII. 1876–79. | | | | Pæstum | | Pæstum | | Christopher Pearse Cranch (1813–1892) |
| | (From Ode to Southern Italy)
THERE, down Salerno’s bay, | |
| In deserts far away, | |
| Over whose solitudes | |
| The dread malaria broods, | |
| No labor tills the land,— | 5 |
| Only the fierce brigand, | |
| Or shepherd, wan and lean, | |
| O’er the wide plains is seen. | |
| Yet there, a lovely dream, | |
| There Grecian temples gleam, | 10 |
| Whose form and mellowed tone | |
| Rival the Parthenon. | |
| The Sybarite no more | |
| Comes hither to adore, | |
| With perfumed offering, | 15 |
| The ocean god and king. | |
| The deity is fled | |
| Long since, but, in his stead, | |
| The smiling sea is seen, | |
| The Doric shafts between; | 20 |
| And round the time-worn base | |
| Climb vines of tender grace, | |
| And Pæstum’s roses still | |
| The air with fragrance fill. | | | | |
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