Classic Poem

I SLEPT awhile, then woke. The night was wild
With the high East Wind's howling — a black hound
That snarled, and rattled at the casement latch,
And shook dry mortars down the twisted flue.
Hound answered hound and both together lifted
Harsh angry notes, and sadder notes that filled
The hapless ear with fright.
I slept and waked at whiles, all hours, and heard
The howling though I slept.
At last, asleep or waking, all was hushed
And from the hush and dark —

Childish familiar images, ghosts of the nights
Of childish loneliness, wonders and fears,
Terrors that drummed my heart then echoing now
The aching drumming. Whose was that figure, tall
Gray and still as a juniper at twilight?
Lot's wife, Pillar of Salt, with blind face towards
Sodom and Gomorrah smouldering in the Plain.
Turn, turn, hoar frozen Pillar, turn yet thine eyes!
Smouldering and guttering in the Plain they lie,
A sullen bubble of fire, Sodom and Gomorrah,
Abhorred and obscure names yet in my ears,
As in my sight the sullen fiery worms
That wrapped them strangling round ...
Turn, turn thine eyes!
And yet she stood, and stands, hoar Pillar of Salt.

And now two figures climbed Moriah's steep,
A young lad bearing wood: and an old man fire,
With a bright knife at his thigh, who mournfully
Upon the topmost mound heaved a new mound,
With shaking purpled hands and eyes that filled.
He laid the wood there, bound
And laid the startled boy there, and uplifted
The knife — already bloody in my eyes
Ere plunged — until a Voice shook from above,
A dreadful Eye hung in the middle of heaven
Pouring sharp rays upon the tawny Mount.
O dreadful Eye, pursuing sleep and dreams
And waking thought,
From cloudless azure casting golden arrows
Into every hole and noisome nook of fear,
Fire-lidded Eye, fire-brow'd. 'Twas not the Voice,
It was the Eye that sank Abraham down
With another horror than the sacrifice,
And Isaac prone upon the waiting pyre
Burned by that Eye of fire.

Whose that tall shape and shining sallow front,
Beaked nose, black brush-like hair and hawk-like eyes,
Lean callous figure by the river's waste
Or desert waste casting his shadow on
Myriad slaves? And what the dreadful cloud,
Darkening and humming death, infinite hordes,
Dusking Imperial Egypt's self with fear?
Horde after horde, hosts of that angered God
Whose smoky fire burned through the locust rivers,
These like another fire ate substance up
And left white famine in a desert of bones.
Saw Pharaoh this dark cloud, and snuffed that fire
Of famine?

— Now Elijah's ravens
Flying to the brook to drink, beheld him prone,
And dropped, as grim Jehovah bade, foul meats
For the sad prophet's need,
Who in the loneliness of loneliness
Raised fleshless arms to plead
For death, or the Lord's judgment on his foes.
The ravens dropping offal, craking death,
Black missive wings between starved earth and hell,
Black wings that rose,
Circled and fell —

Gave place and rose no more.
Jordan's pale shallow stream it was and on the shore
Tumult of wondering tongues; no ravens now,
A dove between John and Jesus fluttering,
Neck-ringed with black, and nimbus'd with pale flame,
And tipt with sapphire flame the light-like wing,
And treading fire when o'er the twain she hung
Between the fierce face and the patient brow
Of John and Jesus as they stood and parted.
— And then the raven wings, and notes
Returned of desert throats.
. . . .

Maybe the wind was slaked awhile and slept,
Or I slept though it raved; but as I turned
The vixen East barked out anew and brought
Voices again that muttered in childish sleep
When sleep was innocent.
Beneath a white Tower lay the tissued corpse
Yet gleaming and yet warm with cunning blood.
The city curs crept out and smelt the blood
Oozing upon the supple golden tissue,
Less supple than the breast and thighs beneath.
Their yelping called new yelping and the dogs
Of that dense kennel sprang and wrangled together,
Their muzzles bloodied with the Queen's warm veins,
While others stood and snarled, " Behold the Queen, "
And one leaned evil from the tower and snarled,
" So ends Queen Jezebel, blessed be the Lord! "
His sharp teeth gleaming like the writhing curs'
That licked the blood and dust that late was hers.

The blood and dust. I saw the cloud curl up
Chasing the bronz'd wheels of the car that drew
The corse of Hector soiled in the dust of Troy;
Moody Achilles frowning as he threw
His armour down like a discarded toy.

And there Prince Absalom, murdered yet beloved,
Hanging from the fatal tree,
His long hair caught amid the ravaged boughs
Of the sere festering wood,
And gray-winged shafts amid his careless breast,
Under the Judas tree.

And other ghosts I saw —
King David casting dust upon his head,
And Sheba's satraps decked on camel towers,
And weary Solomon, wise and cold,
Nodding on a throne of gold;
Caesar's chill craft lined in his hueless smile,
Great-helmed Antony clamouring on Egypt's sands
Beside the ageless Pyramids and old Nile ...
Image with image self-confused, confusing,
And in the wind's rage all old fears reviving,
Terrors that startled childhood, quick and numbing,
Again, the haunting drumming;
And O, again, as once, again thy breast,
Mother, that rocked my heart to rest;
Though when I woke and knew that not again
Thy breast would still me, sharper yet my pain.