The silver state. [volume] (Unionville, Nev.) 1870-1903, 1882-04-10
A NEVADA SUNSET.

The day is spent; behold the setting sun,
Vita golden pencil tipped with silver light,
In farewell greeting reach among the stars
And touch the palette OF eternal hues
That glorify the walks Of other worlds
And paint the vaults and tapestries Of Heaven;
Then, with a single stroke of skill divine,
SO gild the cloudy canvas of the skies
That art stands awed, and seeks, but seeks in
vain
To match its splendors.
Not in Arctic seas;
Net by IL Adria.ie or the Alps;
Not where the Himalayan minarets
Rend into shreds the clouds Of kumaon,
or where the sun, as drops the plummet down.
Dyes red the yapors with its eyes OF fire;
Not where, o'erlooking bright sicilian seas,
The Syracusans watch the amber skies;
or where the clouds, on balmy breezes borne,
Their shadows troop across lEgean isles,
Are looped such pictures FROM the evening
stars.
Yc who would view these glories, come with me
To some brown hill in Autlmn, sloping down
From Tahoe eastward. where the rocky waves,
Die out in ripples on the desert plans.
The sere and scentle : herNags at our feet,
The gnarl'd nut-pne and fragrant juniper,
Scarce feel the breath, cool from the frosty
heights
OF truant zephyrs from the western sea.
Before u.s. far a. haman eye can grasp,
Stretch the Sierra, with its hammered peaks
t..t
Exchanging signals % his airy march.
Along the heights the idly drifting clouds,
In strange accord of color and Of form,
Are blending with and lifting heayenward
With art sublime the mighty granite pie,
All cannon-seamed and capped with endless
SHOWS,
As II the fragments Of a world had dropped.
Behind this wild illusion sinks the sun,
Aud with the glory OF its quenchless beams
Lights up the moving landscape OF the skies
With hues celestial: then the misty peaks,
Their SUBMITS lurid with volcanic fires.
Are rent In noisless tumult; gentle winds,
As with the strength Of Titans. sap the base,
AID from their broad foundations toppling DER,
Their MASSIVE bulk and scarlet batilements
anu aWlhi
Are hursd in fragments TO the plains below;
There taking form as islands of lake
Fast shaping round them-waves OF slken
thread.
Prayed from the fringes Of an ebon cloud
Skirting the distance In low. sloping hills
That bind the waters Of the silver sea
Along It's margins stately mansions rise,
ky,th l.. 4 I..l
And on the peaceful islets. girt with green,
Between which gilded ba~ges come and so,
sleep marble doInes and pillared portieos-
The whole SO rich in splendor and in hue,
SO fair in form, 80 like reality,
That we would still the pulses OF the heart
To catch some whisper froa that silent shore,
As comes the thought. low bent in holy awe,
That angel hands have drawn the curtains back,
That mortal eyes may for moment gaze
Upon the glory OF tina, realm Of souls
Beyond the sunset and the gates OF earth.
Now sinks the sun; the silver of the lake
Has turned to lead, to bronze the FURNISHED
gold;
The circling hills are massing into peaks,
Their erests ablaze with light and plumed with
smoke.
Now from their tops and down their hcaving
sides
Pour streams of liquid lava. drinking up
The waters OF the lake, submerging isles
la awful deluge, and with, breath OF FIRE,
And kissing tufas burning black the vales
turn to hide the ruin from my sight,
And close my ears, perchanee against such
shrieks
As rose amidst the Storm os heated haif
That sepuchred doomed Herculansum.
Again Looked, and lol the fires arequenched;
The sun has dropped behind the granite hills,
And twilight ashss cover all the scene.