Watched over by insuperable peaks, <br />Beneath a leaden sky and copper sun, <br />Surrounded by a desert treeless, dun, <br />Where never comes a cloud, nor tempest shrieks <br />In that still haven lie, with idle beaks <br />And lifeless sails, the Years, their voyage run, <br />The harbour the the Past forever won <br />That each dead epoch with its cargo seeks. <br /> <br />The shore by lurid beacon-fires is gemmed <br />Whose light stains as with blood the billows spent, <br />And sepulchres are strewn the whole extent <br />Betwixt the mountains and the water hemmed- <br />White tombs of kings once augustly enthroned, <br />And now by listless, dusty winds bemoaned.<br /><br />Clark Ashton Smith<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-harbour-of-the-past/
