Oh! thou Atlantic, dark and deep, Thou wilderness of waves, Where all the tribes of earth might sleep In their uncrowded graves! The sunbeams on thy bosom wake, Yet never light thy gloom; The tempests burst, yet never shake Thy depths, thou mighty tomb! Thou thing of mystery, stern and drear, Thy secrets who hath told? Thy warrior and his sword are there, The merchant and his gold. There lie their myriads in thy pall, Secure from steel and storm; And he, the feaster on them all, The canker-worm. Yet on this wave the mountain's brow Once glow'd in morning's beam; And, like an arrow from the bow, Out sprang the stream; And on its bank the olive grove, And the peach's luxury, And the damask rose--the nightbird's love-- Perfumed the sky. Where art thou, proud Atlantis, now? Where are thy bright and brave-- Priest, people, warriors' living flow? Look on that wave. Crime deepen'd on the recreant land, Long guilty, long forgiven; There, power uprear'd the bloody hand, There scoff'd at Heaven. The word went forth--the word of woe-- The judgment thunders pealed; The fiery earthquake blazed below; Its doom was seal'd. Now on its halls of ivory Lie giant weed on ocean slime, Burying from man's and angel's eye The land of crime.
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Published in 1998 by Dennis McCarthy
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