Tossed like a falcon from the hunter's wrist,
A sweeping plunge, a sudden shattering noise,
And thou hast dared, with a long spiral twist,
The elastic stairway to the rising sun.
Peril below thee and above,
Within thy car; but peril cannot
Thy peerless heart: gathering wing and poise,
Thy plane transfigured, and thy
Subduéd to a whisper — then a silence, —And thou art but a disembodied
In the void.
But Death, who has learned to fly,
Still matchless when his work is to be done,
Met thee between the armies and the sun;
Thy speck of shadow faltered in the sky;
Then thy dead engine and thy broken
Drooped through the arc and passed in fire,
A wreath of smoke — a breathless exhalation.
But ere that came a vision sealed thine eyes,
Lulling thy senses with oblivion;
And from its sliding station in the
Thy dauntless soul upward in circles
To the sublime and purest radiance whence it sprang.
In all their eyries, eagles shall mourn thy fate,
And leaving on the lonely crags and
Their unprotected young, shall
High in the tenuous heaven and anger the
With screams, and with a wild
Dare all the battle danger of thy flight;
Till weary with combat one shall desert the light,
Fall like a bolt of thunder and check his
On the high ledge, smoky with mist and cloud,
Where his neglected eaglets shriek aloud,
And drawing the film across his sovereign
Shall dream of thy swift soul
Mounting in circles, faithful beyond death.
Composition date is unknown - the above date represents the first publication date.
Form: irregularly rhyming.
