Читать книгу Poems - John L. Stoddard - Страница 25

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Through the marble gates of Ostia,

Where the Tiber meets the sea,

And a hundred Roman galleys

Strain their leashes to be free,

Streams a flood of sunset glory

From the classic sea of old,

Till Rome's seven hills stand gleaming,

And the Tiber turns to gold.

Why, indifferent to this splendor,

Do the people throng the streets?

What is everyone demanding

Of the stranger whom he meets?

They have heard alas! the rumor

That, ere dawn regilds the sky,

All the world may be in mourning,

For the Emperor must die.

Search, O Romans, through the annals

Of the rulers of your race,

From the zenith of their glory

To their ultimate disgrace—

And as earth's most perfect master,

And the noblest of your line,

You will yield your greatest homage

To this dying Antonine.

For he holds a Caesar's sceptre

In a loving father's hand,

And his heart and soul are given

To the welfare of his land;

Through his justice every nation

Hath beheld its warfare cease,

And he leaves to his successor

Rome's gigantic world at peace.

Hence these nations now are waiting

In an anguish of suspense,

For their future is as doubtful,

As their love for him intense;

By the Nile and on the Danube,

From the Tagus to the Rhine,

There is mourning among millions

For the man they deem divine.

Now the sunset glow is fading,

And the evening shadows creep

O'er the ashen face of Caesar,

As he lies in seeming sleep;

But he slumbers not; for, faithful

To his duties, small and great,

He is not alone the sovereign,

But the servant of the State.

Unrebuked, then, his Centurion,

As the sun-god sinks from sight,

Makes his wonted way to Caesar

For the password of the night;

And great Antonine, though conscious

That ere dawn his soul must pass,

As his last, imperial watchword,

Utters "Aequanimitas!"

O thou noblest of the Caesars,

Whose transcendent virtues shine,

Like a glorious constellation,

O'er the blood-stained Palatine,

When the latest sands are running

From my life's exhausted glass,

May I have thy calm and courage,

And thine Aequanimitas!