Courtesy of Niagara Falls Public Library
Niagara! — that glorious voice of thine,
‡‡With never-ceasing, gathering power, seems still,
‡‡To charm each haunting sense of mortal ill;
It speaks but of the distant — the divine —
It lifts the soul to Nature’s holiest shrine,
‡‡It links the mind, with a surpassing skill,
‡‡To worlds that loftier destinies fulfil, —
Those worlds that scorn Creation’s boundary line.
‡‡Dread Fall! In beauty a crowned Sun of Light!
In action an Atlantic! — such thy force,
‡‡Ocean ‘gainst Ocean, battling in their might,
Were scarce more dreadful than thy raging course; —
‡‡While mounts thy glittering spray the Heavenly Height,
Tossed like the flashing mane of Death’s pale Horse!
Source: Emmeline Stuart-Wortley. On the Approaching Close of the Great Exhibition. London: W.N. Wright, 1851
Click here to read a biography of Emmeline Stuart-Wortley
Stuart-Wortley also wrote a longer poem entitled To Niagara. Click here to see it.
One thought on “To Niagara by Emmeline Stuart-Wortley”