To The Rainbow

Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky     When storms prepare to part,     I ask not proud Philosophy     To teach me what thou art;     Still seem; as to my childhood's sight,     A midway station given     For happy spirits to alight     Betwixt the earth and heaven.     Can all that Optics teach unfold     Thy form to please me so,     As when I dreamt of gems and gold     Hid in thy radiant bow?     When Science from Creation's face     Enchantment's veil withdraws,     What lovely visions yield their place     To cold material laws!     And yet, fair bow, no fabling dreams,     But words of the Most High,     Have told why first thy robe of beams     Was woven in the sky.     When o'er the green, undeluged earth     Heaven's covenant thou didst shine,     How came the world's gray fathers forth     To watch thy sacred sign!     And when its yellow luster smiled     O'er mountains yet untrod,     Each mother held aloft her child     To bless the bow of God.     Methinks, thy jubilee to keep,     The first-made anthem rang     On earth, delivered from the deep,     And the first poet sang.     Nor ever shall the Muse's eye     Unraptured greet thy beam;     Theme of primeval prophecy,     Be still the prophet's theme!     The earth to thee her incense yields,     The lark thy welcome sings,     When, glittering in the freshened fields,     The snowy mushroom springs.     How glorious is thy girdle, cast     O'er mountain, tower, and town,     Or mirrored in the ocean vast,     A thousand fathoms down!     As fresh in yon horizon dark,     As young thy beauties seem,     As when the eagle from the ark     First sported in thy beam:     For, faithful to its sacred page,     Heaven still rebuilds thy span;     Nor lets the type grow pale with age,     That first spoke peace to man.