Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1881-01-04
ID
PO e II r. Y.
THE CLOSING YEAR.
BY GEORGE D. PRENTICE.

'Tis midnight's holy hour-and silence now
Is brooding, like gentle spirit, DER
The still and pulseless world. Hark! ON the
winds
The bells deep tones are swelling; it's the
knell
OF the departed year. No funeral train
Is sweeping past; yet, on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest,
Like pale, spotless shroud the air is stirr'd
AS by mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud,
That floats SO still and placidly through
heaven,
The spirits Of the seasons seem to stani.
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's SOL
emn form,
And Winter with his aged locks, and breathe
In mournful cadences, that come abroad
Like the far wihd-harp's wild and touching
wall,
A melancholy dirge DER the dead year,
Gone from the earth forever. 'Tis time
For memory and for tears. Within the deep,
Still chambers of the heart spectre dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of fTime
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful
And holy visions that have passd away,
And left no shadow of their loveliness
| VII thC uCdu WASTE VI lllo 1udG SptCtTC llIJS
| The coffin-lid of hope. and joy, and love,
And, bending mOurnfuly above the pale
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead
flowers
| Ger what has pass d to nothingness. The year
Has gone, and, with it, many glorious throng
Ofhappy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
| Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course,
1t waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful,
A aran 1oid ifS hon
Upon the strong man. and the naughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
1t trod the hall of revelry, where throng'd
The bright and Joyous, and the fearful wal.
Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song
And reck less shout resounded. It pass'd DER
The battle-plaln, where sword, and spear, and
Flash'd in the light OF midday-and the
strength
Of serried hosts is shiver'd, and the gras4,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
TIE crush'd and mouldering SIX eleton. 1t came
And faded like wreath of mist at eve;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,
1t heralded it's millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams. Remors eless
Fierce spirits of the glass and scythe-what
power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes. that can soar
Through the heavens unfathcmable de- 3ths or
brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks
down
To rest upon his mountain crag,-but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And nights deep darkness mas no chain to
bind
His rushing pinion. Revouti ons sweep
Ger earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
OF dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sinIs
Like bubbles on the water; fiery isles
Spring, blazing, from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns; mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blacken'd cliffs and
bow
Ther tall heads to the plain; new empires
rise,
Gathering the strength OF hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations; and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of GOD,
Glitter while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad. lovelest Of the train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass
| away,
| To darkle in the trackless void yet Time
| Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career
Dark. stern, alI-pitiless, and pauses not
| Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
| Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.