Stowe… Two Vistas

View On Black

 

While others chant of gay Elysian scenes,

Of balmy zephyrs, and of flow'ry plains,

My song more happy speaks a greater name,

Feels higher motives and a nobler flame.

For thee, O R-----, the muse attunes her strings,

And mounts sublime above inferior things.

I sing not now of green embow'ring woods,

I sing not now the daughters of the floods,

I sing not of the storms o'er ocean driv'n,

And how they howl'd along the waste of heav'n.

But I to R----- would paint the British shore,

And vast Atlantic, not untry'd before:

Thy life impair'd commands thee to arise,

Leave these bleak regions and inclement skies,

Where chilling winds return the winter past,

And nature shudders at the furious blast.

 

Phillis Wheatley

Done