Classic and Contemporary Poetry
CENTENNIAL, by JOHN MILTON HAY Poet's Biography First Line: A hundred times the bells of brown Last Line: Through many a hundred tranquil summers! Subject(s): Brown University | ||||||||
A HUNDRED times the bells of Brown Have rung to sleep the idle summers, And still to-day clangs clamoring down A greeting to the welcome comers. And far, like waves of morning, pours Her call, in airy ripples breaking, And wanders to the farthest shores, Her children's drowsy hearts awaking. The wild vibration floats along, O'er heart-strings tense its magic plying, And wakes in every breast its song Of love and gratitude undying. My heart to meet the summons leaps At limit of its straining tether, Where the fresh western sunlight steeps In golden flame the prairie heather. And others, happier, rise and fare To pass within the hallowed portal, And see the glory shining there Shrined in her steadfast eyes immortal. What though their eyes be dim and dull, Their heads be white in reverend blossom; Our mother's smile is beautiful As when she bore them on her bosom! Her heavenly forehead bears no line Of Time's iconoclastic fingers, But o'er her form the grace divine Of deathless youth and wisdom lingers. We fade and pass, grow faint and old, Till youth and joy and hope are banished, And still her beauty seems to fold The sum of all the glory vanished. As while Tithonus faltered on The threshold of the Olympian dawnings, Aurora's front eternal shone With lustre of the myriad mornings. So joys that slip like dead leaves down, And hopes burnt out that die in ashes, Rise restless from their graves to crown Our mother's brow with fadeless flashes. And lives wrapped in tradition's mist These honored halls to-day are haunting, And lips by lips long withered kissed The sagas of the past are chanting. Scornful of absence' envious bar BROWN smiles upon the mystic meeting Of those her sons, who, sundered far, In brotherhood of heart are greeting; Her wayward children wandering on Where setting stars are lowly burning, But still in worship toward the dawn That gilds their souls' dear Mecca turning; Or those who, armed for God's own fight, Stand by his word through fire and slaughter, Or bear our banner's starry light Far-flashing through the Gulf's blue water. For where one strikes for light and truth The right to aid, the wrong redressing, The mother of his spirit's youth Sheds o'er his soul her silent blessing. She gained her crown a gem of flame When KNEASS fell dead in victory gory; New splendor blazed upon her name When IVES' young life went out in glory! Thus bright forever may she keep Her fires of tolerant Freedom burning, Till War's red eyes are charmed to sleep And bells ring home the boys returning. And may she shed her radiant truth In largess on ingenuous comers, And hold the bloom of gracious youth Through many a hundred tranquil summers! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...POEM DELIVERED AT BROWN UNIVERSITY, 1831 by NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS A WOMAN'S LOVE by JOHN MILTON HAY JIM BLUDSO [OF THE PRAIRIE BELLE] by JOHN MILTON HAY MILES KEOGH'S HORSE by JOHN MILTON HAY RELIGION AND DOCTRINE by JOHN MILTON HAY THE STIRRUP-CUP by JOHN MILTON HAY A DREAM OF BRIC-A-BRAC by JOHN MILTON HAY A HAUNTED ROOM by JOHN MILTON HAY |
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