Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Africa: Vol. XXIV. 1876–79.
Marius
By Lydia Maria Child (18021880)P
Fanes quiver in the air,
A prostrate city is thy seat,
And thou alone art there.
Though ruin is around thee;
Thine eye-beam burns as proudly now,
As when the laurel crowned thee.
Though friends and fame depart;
The car of fate may o’er thee roll,
Nor crush thy Roman heart.
Which earth can never tame;
Bright suns may scorch, and dark clouds lower,
Its flash is still the same.
May melt like mist away;
High thoughts may seem, mid passion’s strife,
Like Carthage in decay.
May be to ruin hurled,
Like mouldering monuments of art
Heaped on a sleeping world.
Where life hath once been fair;
Some towering thoughts still rear on high,
Some Roman lingers there!