Voice of the western wind! Thou singest from afar, Rich with the music of a land Where all my memories are; But in thy song I only hear The echo of a tone That fell divinely on my ear In days forever flown. Star of the western sky! Thou beamest from afar, With lustre caught from eyes I knew, Whose orbs were each a star; But, oh, those eyes—too wildly bright— No more eclipse thine own, And never shall I find the light Of days forever flown! FLOOD-TIDE. Just at sunrise, when the land-breeze cooled the fevered air once more, From a restless couch I wandered to the sounding ocean shore; Strolling down through furrowed sand-hills, while the splendor of the day Flashed across the trembling waters to the West and far away. There I saw, in distant moorings, many an anchored vessel tall; Heard with cheery morning voices sailor unto sailor call. Crowned with trailing plumes of sable, right afront my standing-place Moved a swarthy ocean-steamer in her storm-resisting grace. Prophet-like, she clove the waters toward the ancient mother-land, And I heard her clamorous engine and the echo of command, While the long Atlantic billows to my feet came rolling on, With the multitudinous music of a thousand ages gone. There I stood, with careless ankles half in sand and half in spray, Till the baleful mist of midnight from my being passed away; Then, with eager inhalations opening all my mantle wide, Felt my spirit rise exultant with the rising of the tide; Felt the joyous morning breezes run afresh through every vein, Till the natural pulse of manhood beat the call-to-arms again. Then came utterance self-condemning,—oh, how wild with sudden scorn Of the chain that held me circling in a little round forlorn! Of the sloth which, like a vapor, hugs the dull, insensate heart, That can act in meek submission to the lowness of its part,— In the broad terrestrial drama play the herald or the clown, While the warrior wins his garlands and the monarch wears his crown!