My Native Land

Columbia, was thy continent stretch'd wild,
In later ages, the huge seas above?
And art thou Nature's youngest, fairest child,
Most favoured by thy gentle mother's love?
Where now we stand, did ocean monsters rove,
Tumbling uncouth, in those dim, vanished years,
When through the Red Sea Pharaoh's thousands drove,
When struggling Joseph dropp'd fraternal tears,
When God came down from heaven, and mortal men were seers?
Or, have thy forests waved, thy rivers run,
Elysian solitudes, untrod by man,
Silent and lonely, since, around the sun,
Her ever-wheeling circle earth began?
Thy unseen flowers did here the breezes fan,
With wasted perfume ever on them flung?
And o'er thy showers neglected rainbows span,
When Alexander fought, when Homer sung,
And the old populous world with thundering battle rung?
Yet, what to me, or when, or how thy birth, —
No musty tomes are here to tell of thee;
None know, if cast when nature first the earth
Shaped round, and clothed with grass, and flower, and tree,
Or whether since, by changes, silently,
Of sand, and shell, and wave, thy wonders grew;
Or if, before man's little memory,
Some shock stupendous rent the globe in two,
And thee, a fragment, far in western oceans threw.
I know but that I love thee. On my heart,
Like a dear friend's are stamp'd thy features now;
Though there the Roman or the Grecian art
Hath lent, to deck thy plain and mountain brow,
No broken temples, fain at length to bow,
Moss-grown and crumbling, with the weight of time.
Not these o'er thee their mystic splendours throw,
Themes eloquent for pencil or for rhyme,
As many a soul can tell that pours its thoughts sublime,
But thou art sternly artless, wildly free:
We worship thee for beauties all thine own:
Like damsel, young and sweet, and sure to be
Admired, but only for herself alone.
With richer foliage ne'er was land o'ergrown,
No mightier rivers run, nor mountains rise,
Nor ever lakes with lovelier graces shone,
Nor wealthier harvests waved in human eyes,
Nor lay more liquid stars along more heavenly skies.
I dream of thee, fairest of fairy streams,
Sweet Hudson! Float we on thy summer
breast:
Who views thy enchanted windings ever deems
Thy banks, of mortal shores the loveliest!
Hail to thy shelving slopes, with verdure dress'd,
Bright break thy waves the varied beach upon;
Soft rise thy hills, by amorous clouds caress'd;
Clear flow thy waters, laughing in the sun —
Would through such peaceful scenes, my life might gently run!
And, lo! the Catskills print the distant sky,
And o'er their airy tops the faint clouds driven,
So softly blending, that the cheated eye
Forgets or which is earth, or which is heaven, —
Sometimes, like thunder-clouds, they shade the even,
Till, as you nearer draw, each wooded height
Puts off the azure hues by distance given:
And slowly break upon the enamour'd sight,
Ravine, crag, field, and wood, in colours true and bright.
Mount to the cloud-kissed summit. Far below
Spreads the vast champaign like a shoreless sea.
Mark yonder narrow streamlet feebly flow,
Like idle brook that creeps ingloriously;
Can that the lovely, lordly Hudson be,
Stealing by town and mountain? Who beholds,
At break of day this scene, when, silently,
Its map of field, wood, hamlet, is unrolled,
While, in the east, the sun uprears his locks of gold,
Till earth receive him never can forget.
Even when returned amid the city's roar,
The fairy vision haunts his memory yet,
As in the sailor's fancy shines the shore.
Imagination cons the moment o'er,
When first discover'd, awe-struck and amazed,
Scarce loftier Jove — whom men and gods adore —
On the extended earth beneath him gazed,
Temple, and tower, and town, by human insect raised.
Blow, scented gale, the snowy canvass swell,
And flow, thou silver, eddying current on.
Grieve we to bid each lovely point farewell,
That, ere its graces half are seen, is gone.
By woody bluff we steal, by leaning lawn,
By palace, village, cot, a sweet surprise,
At every turn the vision breaks upon;
Till to our wondering and uplifted eyes
The Highland rocks and hills in solemn grandeur rise.
Nor clouds in heaven, nor billows in the deep,
More graceful shapes did ever heave or roll,
Nor came such pictures to a painter's sleep,
Nor beamed such visions on a poet's soul!
The pent-up flood, impatient of control,
In ages past here broke its granite bound,
Then to the sea in broad meanders stole,
While ponderous ruins strew'd the broken ground,
And these gigantic hills forever closed around.
And ever-wakeful echo here doth dwell,
The nymph of sportive mockery, that still
Hides behind every rock, in every dell,
And softly glides, unseen, from hill to hill.
No sound doth rise but mimic it she will, —
The sturgeon's splash repeating from the shore,
Aping the boy's voice with a voice as shrill,
The bird's low warble, and the thunder's roar,
Always she watches there, each murmur telling o'er.
Awake my lyre, with other themes inspired,
Where yon bold point repels the crystal tide,
The Briton youth, lamented and admired,
His country's hope, her ornament and pride,
A traitor's death ingloriously died —
On freedom's altar offered, in the sight
Of God, by men who will their act abide,
On the great day, and hold their deed aright —
To stop the breath would quench young freedom's holy light.
But see! the broadening river deeper flows,
Its tribute floods intent to reach the sea.
While, from the west, the fading sunlight throws
Its softening hues on stream, and field, and tree;
All silent nature bathing, wondrously,
In charms that soothe the heart with sweet desires,
And thoughts of friends we ne'er again may see,
Till lo! ahead, Manhatta's bristling spires,
Above her thousand roofs red with day's dying fires,
May greet the wanderer of Columbia's shore,
Proud Venice of the west! no lovelier scene.
Of thy vast throngs now faintly comes the roar,
Though late like beating ocean surf I ween, —
And everywhere thy various barks are seen,
Cleaving the limpid floods that round thee flow,
Encircled by thy banks of sunny green, —
The panting steamer plying to and fro,
Or the tall sea-bound ship abroad on wings of snow.
And radiantly upon the glittering mass
The god of day his parting glances sends,
As some warm soul, from earth about to pass,
Back on its fading scenes and mourning friends
Deep words of love and looks of rapture bends,
More bright and bright, as near their end they be.
On, on, great orb! to earth's remotest ends,
Each land irradiate, and every sea —
But oh, my native land, not one, not one like thee!