Explore "The Galaxy" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Torrent of light and river of the air, / Along whose bed the glimmering stars are seen / Like gold and silver sands in some ravine / Where mountain streams have left their channels bare! / The Spaniard sees in thee the pathway, where / His patron saint descended in the sheen / Of his celestial armor, on serene / And quiet nights, when all the heavens were fair. / Not this I see, nor yet the ancient fable / Of Phaeton's wild course, that scorched the skies / Where'er the hoofs of his hot coursers trod; / But the white drift of worlds o'er chasms of sable, / The star-dust that is whirled aloft and flies / From the invisible chariot-wheels of God.