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Home  »  The World’s Best Poetry  »  The Silence of the Hills

Bliss Carman, et al., eds. The World’s Best Poetry. 1904.

IV. Inland Waters: Highlands

The Silence of the Hills

William Prescott Foster (b. 1856)

THE WINDY forest, rousing from its sleep,

Voices its heart in hoarse Titanic roar;

The ocean bellows from its rocky shore;

The cataract, that haunts the rugged steep,

Makes mighty music in its headlong leap;

The clouds have voices, and the rivers pour

Their floods in thunder down to ocean’s floor;—

The hills alone mysterious silence keep.

They cannot rend the ancient chain that bars

Their iron lips, nor answer back the sea

That calls to them far off in vain; the stars

They cannot hail, nor their wild brooks. Ah me!

What cries from out their stony hearts will break,

In God’s great day, when all that sleep shall wake!