| |
| NOT only through the golden haze | |
| Of indistinct surprise, | |
| With which the Ocean-bride displays | |
| Her pomp to stranger eyes;— | |
| Not with the fancy’s flashing play, | 5 |
| The traveller’s vulgar theme, | |
| Where following objects chase away | |
| The moment’s dazzling dream;— | |
| |
| Not thus art thou content to see | |
| The city of my love, | 10 |
| Whose beauty is a thought to me | |
| All mortal thoughts above; | |
| And pass in dull unseemly haste, | |
| Nor sight nor spirit clear, | |
| As if the first bewildering taste | 15 |
| Were all the banquet here! | |
| |
| When the proud sea, for Venice’ sake, | |
| Itself consents to wear | |
| The semblance of a land-locked lake, | |
| Inviolably fair; | 20 |
| And in the dalliance of her isles, | |
| Has levelled his strong waves, | |
| Adoring her with tenderer wiles | |
| Than his own pearly caves,— | |
| |
| Surely may we to similar calm | 25 |
| Our noisy lives subdue, | |
| And bare our bosoms to such balm | |
| As God has given to few; | |
| Surely may we delight to pause | |
| On our care-goaded road, | 30 |
| Refuged from Time’s most bitter laws | |
| In this august abode. | |
| |
| Thou knowest this,—thou lingerest here, | |
| Rejoicing to remain; | |
| The plashing oars fall on thy ear | 35 |
| Like a familiar strain; | |
| No wheel prolongs its weary roll, | |
| The earth itself goes round | |
| Slower than elsewhere, and thy soul | |
| Dreams in the void of sound. | 40 |
| |
| Thy heart, by Nature’s discipline, | |
| From all disdain refined, | |
| Kept open to be written in | |
| By good of every kind, | |
| Can harmonize its inmost sense | 45 |
| To every outward tone, | |
| And bring to all experience | |
| High reasoning of its own. | |
| |
| So, when these forms come freely out, | |
| And wonder is gone by, | 50 |
| With patient skill it sets about | |
| Its subtle work of joy; | |
| Connecting all it comprehends | |
| By lofty moods of love,— | |
| The earthly Present’s farthest ends,— | 55 |
| The Past’s deep Heaven above. | |
| |
| O bliss! to watch, with half-shut lid, | |
| By many a secret place, | |
| Where darkling loveliness is hid, | |
| And undistinguished grace,— | 60 |
| To mark the gloom, by slow degrees, | |
| Exfoliate, till the whole | |
| Shines forth before our sympathies, | |
| A soul that meets a soul! | |
| |
| Come out upon the broad Lagoon, | 65 |
| Come for the hundredth time,— | |
| Our thoughts shall make a pleasant tune, | |
| Our words a worthy rhyme; | |
| And thickly round us we will set | |
| Such visions as were seen, | 70 |
| By Tizian and by Tintorett, | |
| And dear old Giambellin,— | |
| |
| And all their peers in art, whose eyes, | |
| Taught by this sun and sea, | |
| Flashed on their works those burning dyes, | 75 |
| That fervent poetry; | |
| And wove the shades so thinly clear | |
| They would be parts of light | |
| In northern climes, where frowns severe | |
| Mar half the charms of sight. | 80 |
| |
| Did ever shape that Paolo drew | |
| Put on such brilliant tire, | |
| As Nature, in this evening view,— | |
| This world of tinted fire? | |
| The glory into whose embrace | 85 |
| The virgin pants to rise | |
| Is but reflected from the face | |
| Of these Venetian skies. | |
| |
| The sun beneath the horizon’s brow | |
| Has sunk, not passed away; | 90 |
| His presence is far lordlier now | |
| Than on the throne of day; | |
| His spirit of splendor has gone forth, | |
| Sloping wide violet rays, | |
| Possessing air and sea and earth | 95 |
| With his essential blaze. | |
| |
| Transpierced, transfused, each densest mass | |
| Melts to as pure a glow, | |
| As images on painted glass | |
| Or silken screens can show. | 100 |
| Gaze on the city,—contemplate | |
| With that fine sense of thine | |
| The Palace of the ancient state,— | |
| That wildly grand design! | |
| |
| How mid the universal sheen | 105 |
| Of marble amber-tinged, | |
| Like some enormous baldaquin | |
| Gay-checkered and deep-fringed, | |
| It stands in air and will not move, | |
| Upheld by magic power,— | 110 |
| The dun-lead domes just caught above,— | |
| Beside, the glooming tower. | |
| |
| Now a more distant beauty fills | |
| Thy scope of ear and eye,— | |
| That graceful cluster of low hills, | 115 |
| Bounding the western sky, | |
| Which the ripe evening flushes cover | |
| With purplest fruitage-bloom,— | |
| Methinks that gold-lipt cloud may hover | |
| Just over Petrarch’s tomb! | 120 |
| |
| Petrarch! when we that name repeat, | |
| Its music seems to fall | |
| Like distant bells, soft-voiced and sweet, | |
| But sorrowful withal;— | |
| That broken heart of love!—that life | 125 |
| Of tenderness and tears! | |
| So weak on earth, in earthly strife,— | |
| So strong in holier spheres! | |
| |
| How in his most of godlike pride, | |
| While emulous nations ran | 130 |
| To kiss his feet, he stept aside | |
| And wept the woes of man! | |
| How in his genius-woven bower | |
| Of passion ever green, | |
| The world’s black veil fell, hour by hour, | 135 |
| Him and his rest between. | |
| |
| Welcome such thoughts;—they well atone | |
| With this more serious mood | |
| Of visible things that night brings on, | |
| In her cool shade to brood; | 140 |
| The moon is clear in heaven and sea, | |
| Her silver has been long | |
| Slow-changing to bright gold, but she | |
| Deserves a separate song. | |
| |
