Classic Poem

ONE !

A sigh, as from a sleeping host, begins to stir the air;
A voice from an awakening band whose numbers none compare;
The earth is to its center stirred, and on their crumbling base,
Old monuments are toppling down, in ruin and disgrace.

Upon the lower sky a gleam is reddening up the East,
As if the sun, ere early morn; would to his journey haste;
Strange faces, wondrous sweet, like those for which our torn hearts yearn,
Peer out, benignantly, from clouds that in the radiance burn.

In Mason Lodges, here and there, where taper light still burns,
Lo, every Brother from the open page of Scripture turns!
He turns, he looks beyond the East, beyond the Master's chair,
And wonders at the kindling blaze that stains the Orient there.

The Master drops his gavel now, — the Omnipotent is heard;
The Tyler leaves his trust uncalled, resigns his useless sword;
The Scribe shuts up his volume, for the penman's work is done;
And all may see Eternity's great promised morn's begun.