Skip to content
Linespedia

On the Cliffs, Newport

By Alan Seeger

Topics: classic

Tonight a shimmer of gold lies mantled o'er     Smooth lovely Ocean. Through the lustrous gloom     A savor steals from linden trees in bloom     And gardens ranged at many a palace door.     Proud walls rise here, and, where the moonbeams pour     Their pale enchantment down the dim coast-line,     Terrace and lawn, trim hedge and flowering vine,     Crown with fair culture all the sounding shore.     How sweet, to such a place, on such a night,     From halls with beauty and festival a-glare,     To come distract and, stretched on the cool turf,     Yield to some fond, improbable delight,     While the moon, reddening, sinks, and all the air     Sighs with the muffled tumult of the surf!

AI analysis available. Enable JavaScript to interact.

About this line

"Tonight a shimmer of gold lies mantled o'er..."

"On the Cliffs, Newport" is a quintessential example of Alan Seeger's signature style... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

Attribution & Rights

Author:Alan Seeger

"Tonight a shimmer of gold lies mantled o'er..." by Alan Seeger

For usage rights, copyright concerns, or to report an issue with this content, please visit our Copyright & Report page.

Related lines

"I loved illustrious cities and the crowds     That eddy through their incandescent nights.     I loved remote horizons with far clouds     Gird"

"I fancied, while you stood conversing there,     Superb, in every attitude a queen,     Her ermine thus Boadicea bare,     So moved amid the mu"

"I     First, London, for its myriads; for its height,     Manhattan heaped in towering stalagmite;     But Paris for the smoothness of the"

"Oft as by chance, a little while apart     The pall of empty, loveless hours withdrawn,     Sweet Beauty, opening on the impoverished heart,"

"Here morning in the ploughman's songs is met     Ere yet one footstep shows in all the sky,     And twilight in the east, a doubt as yet,     S"

"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

Alan Seeger

About Alan Seeger

Alan Seeger (1888–1916) was an American poet who fought in the French Foreign Legion during World War I. His poem "I Have a Rendezvous with Death" is one of the most famous war poems, and he was killed in action at the Battle of the Somme.

Full Bibliography
Continue Reading

"I loved illustrious cities and the crowds     That..."

Weekly Poetic Insight

Join our literary Sanctuary

Get the most inspiring lines, poetic analysis, and secret shayaris delivered to your inbox every Sunday.