Charles Timothy Brooks

Charles Timothy Brooks Poems

Charles Timothy Brooks Biography

Charles Timothy Brooks (June 20, 1813 – June 14, 1883) was a noted American translator of German works, a poet, Transcendentalist and a Unitarian pastor. Born in Salem, Massachusetts, he graduated at Harvard in 1832, then studied theology and in 1835 began to preach in Nahant, Massachusetts. He served as a preacher in various New England towns until he became pastor of the Unitarian church in Newport, Rhode Island on June 4, 1837, where he remained until his death in 1883. In addition to his translations, he published theological writings, contributed to The Dial, a transcendentalist publication, and wrote a biography of William Ellery Channing, another Unitarian minister in Newport, Rhode Island (William Ellery Channing: A Centennial Memory, 1880).)

The Best Poem Of Charles Timothy Brooks

To the Mississippi

Majestic stream! along thy banks,
In silent, stately, solemn ranks,
The forests stand, and seem with pride
To gaze upon thy mighty tide;
As when, in olden classic time,
Beneath a soft, blue Grecian clime,
Bent o'er the stage, in breathless awe,
Crowds thrilled and trembled, as they saw
Sweep by the pomp of human life,
The sounding flood of passion's strife,
And the great stream of history
Glide on before the musing.
There, row on row, the gazers rise;
Above, look down the arching skies;
O'er all those gathered multitudes
Such deep and voiceful silence broods,
Methinks one mighty heart I hear
Beat high with hope, or quake with fear;-
E'en so yon groves and forests seem
Spectators of this rushing stream.
In sweeping, circling ranks they rise,
Beneath the blue o'erarching skies;
They crowd around and forward lean,
As eager to behold the scene-
To see, proud river! sparkling wide,
The long procession of thy tide-
To stand and gaze, and feel with thee
All thy unuttered ecstasy.
It seems as if a heart did thrill
Within yon forests, deep and still,
So soft and ghost-like is the sound
That stirs their solitude profound.

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