Music by Alice Cary

Music by Alice Cary
 (1820 - 1871)


There is music, deep and solemn 
   Floating through the vaulted arch 
When, in many an angry column, 
   Clouds take up their stormy march: 
O’er the ocean billows, heaping 
    Mountains on the sloping sands, 
There are ever wildly sweeping 
    Shapeless and invisible hands. 

Echoes full of truth and feeling 
   From the olden bards sublime, 
Are, like spirits, brightly stealing
   Through the broken walls of time. 
The universe, that glorious palace, 
    Thrills and trembles as they float, 
Like the little blossom’s chalice
     With the humming of the mote. 

On the air, as birds in meadows—
   Sweet embodiments of song—
Leave their bright fantastic shadows 
    Trailing goldenly along. 
Till, aside our armor laying, 
    We like prisoners depart, 
In the soul is music playing 
    To the beating of the heart.

This poem is in the public domain. 

“Alice Cary was born on April 26, 1820, near Cincinnati, Ohio. She is the coauthor of The Poems of Alice and Phoebe Carey (T.Y. Crowell & Company, 1903) with her sister Phoebe, Lyra and Other Poems (Redfield, 1852), Poems (Ticknor and Fields, 1855), and Ballads, Lyrics and Hymns (Hurd and Houghton, 1866). A supporter of the women’s suffrage and abolitionist movements, Alice served as the first president of Sorosis, the first all-women’s club. She died on February 12, 1871, in New York.” Poets.org