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But stay! these walls, these ivy-clad arcades,
These mouldering plinths, these sad and blackened shafts,
These vague entablatures, this crumbling frieze,
These shattered cornices, this wreck, this ruin,
These stones--alas! these gray stones--are they all, 30
All of the famed and the colossal left
By the corrosive Hours to Fate and me?
"Not all"--the Echoes answer me--"not all!
Prophetic sounds and loud arise forever
From us, and from all Ruin, unto the wise, 35
As melody from Memnon to the Sun.
We rule the hearts of mightiest men--we rule
With a despotic sway all giant minds.
We are not impotent, we pallid stones:
Not all our power is gone, not all our fame, 40
Not all the magic of our high renown,
Not all the wonder that encircles us,
Not all the mysteries that in us lie,
Not all the memories that hang upon
And cling around about us as a garment, 45
Clothing us in a robe of more than glory."
HYMN
At morn--at noon--at twilight dim,
Maria! thou hast heard my hymn.
In joy and woe, in good and ill,
Mother of God, be with me still!
When the hours flew brightly by, 5
And not a cloud obscured the sky,
My soul, lest it should truant be,
Thy grace did guide to thine and thee.
Now, when storms of fate o'ercast
Darkly my Present and my Past, 10
Let my Future radiant shine
With sweet hopes of thee and thine!
TO ONE IN PARADISE
Thou wast all that to me, love,
For which my soul did pine:
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, 5
And all the flowers were mine.
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