GENIUS of Raphael! if thy wings | |
| Might bear thee to this glen, | |
| With faithful memory left of things | |
| To pencil dear and pen, | |
| Thou wouldst forego the neighboring Rhine, | 5 |
| And all his majesty, | |
| A studious forehead to incline | |
| O’er this poor family. | |
| |
| The mother, her thou must have seen, | |
| In spirit, ere she came | 10 |
| To dwell those rifted rocks between, | |
| Or found on earth a name; | |
| An image, too, of that sweet boy, | |
| Thy inspirations give,— | |
| Of playfulness and love and joy, | 15 |
| Predestined here to live. | |
| |
| Downcast, or shooting glances far, | |
| How beautiful his eyes, | |
| That blend the nature of the star | |
| With that of summer skies! | 20 |
| I speak as if of sense beguiled; | |
| Uncounted months are gone, | |
| Yet am I with that Jewish child, | |
| That exquisite Saint John. | |
| |
| I see the dark-brown curls, the brow, | 25 |
| The smooth, transparent skin, | |
| Refined, as with intent to show | |
| The holiness within; | |
| The grace of parting infancy | |
| By blushes yet untamed; | 30 |
| Age faithful to the mother’s knee, | |
| Nor of her arms ashamed. | |
| |
| Two lovely sisters, still and sweet | |
| As flowers, stand side by side; | |
| Their soul-subduing looks might cheat | 35 |
| The Christian of his pride; | |
| Such beauty hath the Eternal poured | |
| Upon them not forlorn, | |
| Though of a lineage once abhorred, | |
| Nor yet redeemed from scorn. | 40 |
| |
| Mysterious safeguard, that, in spite | |
| Of poverty and wrong, | |
| Doth here preserve a living light, | |
| From Hebrew fountains sprung; | |
| That gives this ragged group to cast | 45 |
| Around the dell a gleam | |
| Of Palestine, of glory past, | |
| And proud Jerusalem! | |
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