oh earth what changes has thou seen? There were the long street roars hath been the stillness of the central sea. The hills of shadows and they flow from form to form, and nothing stands, like clouds that shape themselves and go...
and my comprehension has been fixed:
It's an excerpt from Alfred Lord Tennyson's "In Memoriam":
O earth, what changes hast thou seen!
There where the long street roars, hath been
The stillness of the central sea.
The hills are shadows, and they flow
From form to form, and nothing stands;
They melt like mist, the solid lands,
Like clouds they shape themselves and go.