 | The poems and prose writings of Sumner Lincoln Fairfield |  |
“How like the gusty moans of tempest nights
O'er the broad winter wilderness, that voice
Ascends; and what a horrid gleam is flung
Along that face of madness, as it turns
From sea to mountain, and the wild eyes burn
With revelations of the unborn time!
We may not linger—shelter earth denies—
The very heavens like a gehenna lour—
And ocean is our refuge—on—on—on!
Yet hark! the wildest shriek of death! and lo!
The priest falls gasping from the ramparts now—
The breath of oracles upon his lips,
The Future's knowledge in his dying heart.
He reels—pants—gazes on the sulphur light—
(How like the glare of hell it wraps his form!)
Expiring, mutters woe—and falls to sleep
Shroudless in the red burial of the doomed!
—On to the ocean! and, far o'er its waves,
To Rhætia's home of glaciers—if God wills!
Look not behind! a moment gains the shore!”
So Pansa cried, and windlike was their flight.
O'er the broad winter wilderness, that voice
Ascends; and what a horrid gleam is flung
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From sea to mountain, and the wild eyes burn
With revelations of the unborn time!
We may not linger—shelter earth denies—
The very heavens like a gehenna lour—
And ocean is our refuge—on—on—on!
Yet hark! the wildest shriek of death! and lo!
The priest falls gasping from the ramparts now—
The breath of oracles upon his lips,
The Future's knowledge in his dying heart.
He reels—pants—gazes on the sulphur light—
(How like the glare of hell it wraps his form!)
Expiring, mutters woe—and falls to sleep
Shroudless in the red burial of the doomed!
—On to the ocean! and, far o'er its waves,
To Rhætia's home of glaciers—if God wills!
Look not behind! a moment gains the shore!”
So Pansa cried, and windlike was their flight.
| The poems and prose writings of Sumner Lincoln Fairfield | |