Page:Poems Sigourney 1827.pdf/93

It comes! It comes!—that misty speck
    Which over the waters moves!
It boasts nor sail, nor mast, nor deck,
Yet dearer to him was that nameless wreck
    Than the maid to him who loves.

It bears to the warrior's nerveless arm
    The might of a victor's aim,
Its freight is a spell whose mystic charm
Shall protect the tottering sire from harm,
And the ire-doom'd babe, whose life-blood warm
    Was to hiss in the wigwam's flame.

The eye of the king with that lightning blazed
    Which the soul in its rapture sends;
His prayer to the Spirit of Good he raised
And the shades of his buried Fathers praised
    As toward his fort he wends.

That king hath gone to his lowly grave!
    He slumbers in dark decay;
And like the crest of the tossing wave,
Like the rush of the blast from the mountain cave,
Like the groan of the murder'd, with none to save,
    His people have passed away.

The monarch hath gone, but his rocky throne
    Still rests on its frowning base;
Its motionless guards rise in phalanx lone,
And nought save the winds through their helmets that moan,
And none but those bosoms and hearts of stone
    Sigh o'er a fallen race.