Page:Southern Life in Southern Literature.djvu/243

This page needs to be proofread.
EDGAR ALLAN POE
225


We follow where the Swamp Fox guides, We leave the swamp and cypress tree, Our spurs are in our coursers sides, And ready for the strife are we. The Tory camp is now in sight, And there he cowers within his den; He hears our shouts, he dreads the fight, He fears, and flies from Marion s men.

EDGAR ALLAN POE

[For sketch of Poe s life see page 27.]

TO HELEN

Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nice an barks of yore, That gently, o er a perfumed sea, The weary, wayworn wanderer bore To his own native shore. On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, Thy Naiad airs have brought me home To the glory that was Greece, And the grandeur that was Rome. Lo! in yon brilliant window niche How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand! Ah, Psyche, from the regions which Are Holy-Land!