A Wine of Wizardry Author:George Sterling Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: TO EDGAR ALLAN POE Time, who but jests with sword and sovereignty, Confirming these as phantoms in his gloom Or bubbles that his arid hours consume, Shall... more » mold an undeparting light of thee— A star whereby futurity shall see How Song's eventual majesties illume, Beyond Augustan pomp or battle-doom, Her annals of abiding heraldry. Time, tho' his mordant ages gnaw the crag, Shall blot no hue from thy seraphic wings Nor vex thy crown and choral glories won, Albeit the solvents of Oblivion drag To dust the sundered sepulchers of kings, In desolations splendid with the sun. IN EXTREMIS Till dawn the Winds' insuperable throng Passed over like archangels in their might, With roar of chariots from their stormy height, And broken thunder of mysterious song— By mariner or sentry heard along The star-usurping battlements of night— And wafture of immeasurable flight, And high-blown trumpets mutinous and strong. Till louder on the dreadful dark I heard The shrieking of the tempest-tortured tree, And deeper on immensity the call And tumult of the empire-forging sea; But near the eternal Peace I lay, nor stirred, Knowing the happy dead hear not at all. ROMANCE Thou passest, and we know thee not, Romance! Thy gaze is backward, and thy heart is fed With murmurs and with music of the dead. Alas, our battle ! for the rays that glance On thy dethroning sword and haughty lance Are of forgotten suns and stars long fled; Thou weavest phantom roses for thy head, And ghostly queens in thy dominion dance. Would we might follow thy returning wings, And in thy farthest haven beach our prow— Thy dragons conquered and thine oceans crossed— And find thee standing on the dust of kings, A lion at thy side, and on thy brow The lig...« less