Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Italy: Vols. XI–XIII. 1876–79.
Naples
By William Gibson (1826–1887)D
Still the soft airs that fan thee seem enchanted;
By song and beauty crescent shores still haunted
Along thy bright bay, once the siren’s sea!
Well I remember, gazing now on thee,
The wishful dreams, with which my childhood panted,
Of charms, in volumes of dumb Latin vaunted,
Or vowelled in rich Italian melody.
From Capri’s rocky isle, where ruins gray
The memory of the first proud Cæsars rear
To where Misenum overlooks the bay,—
Rome’s galley-navy used to anchor near,—
The shades of yore, the lights of yesterday,
Hallow each wall and wave and headland here!