The Downing legends : Stories in Rhyme :: :: University of Virginia Library

A fierce, incessant, deafening roll,
Unmatched solemnity of sound,
It shook the air, the solid ground,
It stunned the senses, numbed the soul.
It charmed in slaying, like the cry
Of ambushed tigers charming one
Who spies the monsters creeping nigh
And hears them snarl, yet cannot run.
Meanwhile the giant slayer had
No hate nor triumph in its tone;
No purpose, whether fierce or glad,
But mastered them as things unknown.
It saw them not, it felt them not;
They were as creatures unbegot.
They were a little froth—no more;
A breath amid that rush and roar.
They passed: no human word can tell
How suddenly they came and went:
One moment speeding tow'rd the hell
Of surges: then afar, or spent.

They flitted like a random thought;
Like ghosts they vanisht into naught;
For, long before they reached the base
Of that descending ocean, they
Were folded white from foot to face
In vasty winding-sheets of spray.
Yea, there the hunter lost his prey,
And drove alone, unknowing where,

Through fearful caves of maddened waves
That whirled and hurtled even there,
Like tigers struggling into graves
And battling over corpses bare.