TO-M TWO WISHES. O-MORROW is our only day of meeting; With very pain my hoping heart is beating, But 'tis a pain that's sweet. The moments drawl like hours; Whate'er of life doth intervene My hope and promised joy between, Destroy it; make to-morrow of to-day; Push Time along-let Time run fast away! To-morrow's here, and now it is our meeting; Oh! we have met again; What earthly paradise appears this greeting! But 'tis a joy with pain. The hours like moments fly; Oh! all ye powers on high, Cut short my future if ye will, But make my present life stand still : The passage toward to-morrow morning stay, Rock Time to sleep-let Time not run away! VISIT TO THE NOBLE RUINS OF KOM OMBO. Standing on an eminence on the east bank of the Nile, between Edfou and Assouan, where the river is fast undermining the land. Time, sunset. January 18, 1880. ASS not my ruin scornful by, PASS Nor slight my fractured majesty, Though no such fragments can I show Ye who at hour of sunset come My smothered shafts, my broken brow, As one who, certain of decay, For why recall my foolish past, Since they who reared me could not last? Or why repeat my brilliant story, If grand in ruin as in glory? Well! my vast fabric was designed Flow, Nile, to undermine the land Whereon my yet left ruins stand, Flow, Time, to work thy constant ill, Το my last stone I'm steadfast still! Long, long, my god of light has flown, And stranger, go! night falls, and soon, A ghostly light like life shall pour Where darkness doth become far more. Go, stranger, go! and leave on high Kom Ombo towering to the sky, And if, perchance, your friends among My name should move your wondering tongue, Then this my vengeful word recall, I nurse while tottering to my fall, When blankness shall my throne possess, Old Nile shall boast one glory less! |