A Sleeping City
Two hours past midnight — how the city sleeps!
But how heaven marches ! When I last lay down
No star I knew was in the azure deeps ;
Blank was the vault as this vast silent town. Look now ! Look there ! The obverse now upwhirled !
Bossy and spiked with fires from th’ underworld,
With great Orion’s mailed arm and heel,
The Bull’s horns tipped with suns, the hosts of steel
A serried stream, upon the mighty Way!
At what command ? Whence is it all this sweeps ?
Adown what drifting void, what black abyss?
Who knows ? Sleep, then, not struggle, sting, and hiss !
Sleep close! sleep well! all Life that Nature steeps
And wakes but to remand to sleep, mold, growth, decay!
But how heaven marches ! When I last lay down
No star I knew was in the azure deeps ;
Blank was the vault as this vast silent town. Look now ! Look there ! The obverse now upwhirled !
Bossy and spiked with fires from th’ underworld,
With great Orion’s mailed arm and heel,
The Bull’s horns tipped with suns, the hosts of steel
A serried stream, upon the mighty Way!
At what command ? Whence is it all this sweeps ?
Adown what drifting void, what black abyss?
Who knows ? Sleep, then, not struggle, sting, and hiss !
Sleep close! sleep well! all Life that Nature steeps
And wakes but to remand to sleep, mold, growth, decay!
E. H. Clement.