Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
America: Vols. XXV–XXIX. 1876–79.
Weehawken
By Fitz-Greene Halleck (1790–1867)W
All we adore of Nature in her wild
And frolic hour of infancy is met;
And never has a summer’s morning smiled
Upon a lovelier scene than the full eye
Of the enthusiast revels on, when high
O’er crags that proudly tower above the deep,
And knows that sense of danger which sublimes
The breathless moment, when his daring step
Is on the verge of the cliff, and he can hear
The low dash of the wave with startled ear,
And clings to the green turf with desperate force,
As the heart clings to life; and when resume
The currents in his veins their wonted course,
There lingers a deep feeling, like the moan
Of wearied ocean when the storm is gone.
Ocean and earth and heaven burst before him.
Clouds slumbering at his feet, and the clear blue
Of Summer’s sky, in beauty bending o’er him,—
The city bright below; and far away,
Sparkling in golden light, his own romantic bay.
And banners floating in the sunny air;
And white sails o’er the calm blue waters bent,
Green isle and circling shore, are blended there,
In wild reality. When life is old,
And many a scene forgot, the heart will hold
Whose infant breath was drawn, or boyhood’s days
Of happiness were passed beneath that sun,
That in his manhood’s prime can calmly gaze
Upon that bay or on that mountain stand,
Nor feel the prouder of his native land.