| |
| WHAT! alive and so bold, O Earth? | |
| Art thou not over-bold? | |
| What! leapest thou forth as of old | |
| In the light of thy morning mirth, | |
| The last of the flock of the starry fold? | 5 |
| Ha! leapest thou forth as of old? | |
| Are not the limbs still when the ghost is fled? | |
| And canst thou more, Napoleon being dead? | |
| |
| How! is not thy quick heart cold? | |
| What spark is alive on thy hearth? | 10 |
| How! is not his death-knell knolled? | |
| And livest thou still, Mother Earth? | |
| Thou wert warming thy fingers old | |
| O’er the embers covered and cold | |
| Of that most fiery spirit, when it fled— | 15 |
| What, Mother, do you laugh now he is dead? | |
| |
| “Who has known me of old,” replied Earth, | |
| “Or who has my story told? | |
| It is thou who art over-bold.” | |
| And the lightening of scorn laughed forth | 20 |
| As she sung, “To my bosom I fold | |
| All my sons when their knell is knolled, | |
| And so with living motion all are fed, | |
| And the quick spring like weeds out of the dead. | |
| |
| “Still alive and still bold,” shouted Earth, | 25 |
| “I grow bolder, and still more bold. | |
| The dead fill me ten thousandfold | |
| Fuller of speed, and splendour, and mirth; | |
| I was cloudy, and sullen, and cold, | |
| Like a frozen chaos uprolled, | 30 |
| Till by the spirit of the mighty dead | |
| My heart grew warm. I feed on whom I fed. | |
| |
| “Ay, alive and still bold,” muttered Earth, | |
| “Napoleon’s fierce spirit rolled, | |
| In terror, and blood, and gold, | 35 |
| A torrent of ruin to death from his birth. | |
| Leave the millions who follow to mould | |
| The metal before it is cold, | |
| And weave into his shame, which like the dead | |
| Shrouds me, the hopes that from his glory fled.” | 40 |
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