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Odes, lyrics and sonnets from the poetic works of James Russell Lowell
Odes lyrics and sonnets from the poetic works of James Russell Lowell Author:James Russell Lowell Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: The glow of his transmitted touch to share, And trace his features with an eye less dim Than ours whose sense familiar wont makes numb. Florence, Italy, Febru... more »ary, 1874. UNDER THE OLD ELM. POEM READ AT CAMBRIDGE ON THE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF WASHINGTON'S TAKING COMMAND OF THE AMERICAN ARMY, 30 JULY, 1775. ORDS pass as wind, but where great deeds were done A power abides transfused from sire to son : The boy feels deeper meanings thrill his ear, That tingling through his pulse life-long shall run, With sure impulsion to keep honor clear, When, pointing down, his father whispers, " Here, Here, where we stand, stood he, the purely Great, Whose soul no siren passion could un- sphere, Then nameless, now a power and mixed with fate." Historic town, thou holdest sacred dust, Once known to men as pious, learned, just, And one memorial pile that dares to last; But Memory greets with reverential kiss No spot in all thy circuit sweet as this, Touched by that modest glory as it past, O'er which yon elm hath piously displayed These hundred years its monumental shade. Of our swift passage through this scenery Of life and death, more durable than we, What landmark so congenial as a tree Repeating its green legend every spring, And, with a yearly ring, Recording the fair seasons as they flee, Type of our brief but still-renewed mortality ? We fall as leaves : the immortal trunk remains, Builded with costly juice of hearts and brains Gone to the mould now, whither all that Vanish returnless, yet are procreant still In human lives to come of good or ill, And feed unseen the roots of Destiny. 11. i. Men's monuments, grown old, forget their names They should eternize, but the place Where shining souls have passed imbibes ...« less