Lit2Go

To the south lie the magical mountains,
That half circling the horizon rise;
The mystical, magical, faraway mountains,—
In the depth of the tropical skies.

They are fairer than mountains are ever
In the lands of a gloomier sun;
Their peaks,—like visions mirage-like,—forever—
Are as goals that may never be won.

Like the mountains of enchanted story;
Or the pictured Delectable range,—
They are clothed in a tremulous glamourous glory
Through wondrous virginal change.

In the morn,— faint dim in the azure—
As a mind-haunting dream-thought they lie;
Elusive, intangible,—trance-born,—they measure
An infinite depth in the sky.

‘Neath the spell of tropical beaming,
Their dream-merging tracings upon,
—As impelled by a pulsing supernal,—their seeming
Is nearer, mysteriously drawn.

Ever fairer, and nearer, and clearer,
—Like a dream coming consciously true,—
As from out a fairy-like wonderful mirror,
Their peak-lines emerge from the blue.

And at last o’er the shimmering fountains,
Lying sparkling and gleaming between,
Rise the clear-imaged heights of the magical mountains,
All enclothed in a glamourous sheen.

As I gaze on their mystical splendor,
From the palm-grove beside of the sea;
I glimpse of a land where the fancy may enter
But never the spirit may be.

Of a land where the colors are golden,
And of snowy and heavenly white;
Where the lustrous dreaming in which it is holden
Never is darkened with shadings of night.

But radiant for always—and ever,
In pure supernatural rays;
Fleecy white always blending with golden,—forever,
Through changeless monotonous days.

And serene; unaffected with sadness,
Or the pulsings that earth beauty mar:
Yet never enlightened with tingeings of gladness:
—For nothing but Fancies there are!

And the fancy delights in that leisure
Of those mountains where peace ever reigns:
—But their magical, mystical, glamourous treasure
Holds a calmness the spirit disdains.—

So they lie in the glimmerings golden;
Untroubled and calm—far-away—:
In a fanciful lustrous beauty enfolden
Through the dreamy-long, tropic day…

At the day-close, the magical mountains
  Fade away in a golden-like haze,—
And no glimpsings are left ‘bove the darkening fountains
  And no tracings through the swift-falling maze…

I would not dwell in the magical mountains,
  Where never the golden light dies;—
For, ‘tis joy of the fancy,—and none of the spirit,—those mountains
  In the depth of the tropical skies.