Classic Poem

By sweet love we are not weak,
And our vengeance we can wreak
Upon any foe audacious who doth dare to stand before us!
There is danger in our eyes,
There is slaughter in our cries,
When the blaring trumpets thunder and our banners flutter o'er us.

We have fallen like a rain
On the cowards of the plain.
We have thrust our glittering lances in their bosoms unvictorious.
We have faced the Girgashites
And the haughty Jebusites,
And have made the valley pregnant with their carcasses inglorious!

The Rephaim we have sought
In their fastnesses, and fought
With these monsters than trees taller, all in iron and armor shielded.
We have met them face to face,
And by Vul's immortal grace
We have stricken and have felled them till their haughty spirit yielded!

Amraphel of far Shinar,
In his burnished battle-car,
We have met upon the meadows in the combat fierce and frantic,
And have saved from heroes' graves
Even his sons, to be our slaves,
And have crushed his power triumphant by our prowesses gigantic!

Oh, sweet Anu, if our king,
Holy Bera, with the sting
Of our lashing swords and lances will allow us to adore thee,
On the Hittites we will fall,
And their chiefs and maidens all
We will smite, and slay, and ravish, and in thousands bring before thee!

For we weary of all rest;
There is rust upon our breast,
And we tire of Sodom's splendor and the pretty zonah's tattle!
There are foemen in the plain;
Lead us onward there again,
Oh, great Nergal! while we languish for the glories of the battle!
And echoing the defiance of their throats,
In Vul's dark sanctuary the high priests sang:

" Oh, mighty Nergal! guard our sacred city;
Watch us and bless us in thy holy pity;
Lighten our brows and waft thy blessings o'er us;
Give us the strength all time to bow before thee;
Give us eternal seasons to adore thee,
And we will praise thee through our brass sonorous! "

Then the sweet wings of night upon the town
Were softly spread, and all its ways were still.