Roll on, ye Stars! exult in youthful prime, Mark with bright curves the printless steps of Time; Near and more near your beamy cars approach, And lessening orbs on lessening orbs encroach; - Flowers of the sky! ye too to age must yield, Frail as your silken sisters of the field! Star after star from Heaven's high arch shall rush, Suns sink on suns, and systems systems crush, Headlong, extinct, to one dark center fall, And Death and Night and Chaos mingle all! - Till o'er the wreck, emerging from the storm, Immortal Nature lifts her changeful form, Mounts from her funeral pyre on wings of flame, And soars and shines, another and the same.

Soon shall thy arm, unconquer'd steam! afar Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car; Or on wide-waving wings expanded bear The flying chariot through the f…

No radiant pearl which crested Fortune wears, No gem that twinkling hangs from Beauty's ears, Not the bright stars which Night's blue arch adorn, Nor rising su…

Organic life beneath the shoreless waves Was born and nurs'd in ocean's pearly caves; First forms minute, unseen by spheric glass, Move on the mud, or pierce t…

They darted down and rose up like a wave Or buzzed impetuously as before; One would have thought the corpse was held a slave To living by the life it bore!

And there, a field rat, startled, squealing bleeds, His belly close to ground. I see the blade, Blood-stained, continue cutting weeds and shade

Death is an angel with two faces: To us he turns A face of terror, blighting all things fair; The other burns With glory of the stars, and love is there.