Music

There is music, deep and solemn 

   Floating through the vaulted arch 

When, in many an angry column, 

   Clouds take up their stormy march: 

O’er the ocean billows, heaping 

    Mountains on the sloping sands, 

There are ever wildly sweeping 

    Shapeless and invisible hands. 

Echoes full of truth and feeling 

   From the olden bards sublime, 

Are, like spirits, brightly stealing

   Through the broken walls of time. 

The universe, that glorious palace, 

    Thrills and trembles as they float, 

Like the little blossom’s chalice

     With the humming of the mote. 

On the air, as birds in meadows—

   Sweet embodiments of song—

Leave their bright fantastic shadows 

    Trailing goldenly along. 

Till, aside our armor laying, 

    We like prisoners depart, 

In the soul is music playing 

    To the beating of the heart.