Marius

Suggested by a Painting by Vanderlyn, of Marius Seated among the Ruins of Carthage

Pillars are fallen at thy feet,   
  Fanes quiver in the air,   
A prostrate city is thy seat,   
  And thou alone art there.   
 
No change comes o’er thy noble brow,           
  Though ruin is around thee;   
Thine eye-beam burns as proudly now,   
  As when the laurel crowned thee.   
 
It cannot bend thy lofty soul,   
  Though friends and fame depart;           
The car of fate may o’er thee roll,   
  Nor crush thy Roman heart.   
 
And Genius hath electric power,   
  Which earth can never tame;   
Bright suns may scorch, and dark clouds lower,           
  Its flash is still the same.   
 
The dreams we loved in early life   
  May melt like mist away;   
High thoughts may seem, mid passion’s strife,   
  Like Carthage in decay.           
 
And proud hopes in the human heart   
  May be to ruin hurled,   
Like mouldering monuments of art   
  Heaped on a sleeping world.   
 
Yet there is something will not die,           
  Where life hath once been fair;   
Some towering thoughts still rear on high,   
  Some Roman lingers there!