1864
Listless he eyes the palisades
And sentries in the glare;
‘Tis barren as a pelican-beach
But his world is ended there.
Nothing to do; and vacant hands
Bring on the idiot-pain;
He tries to think–to recollect,
But the blur is on his brain.
Around him swarm the plaining ghosts
Like those on Virgil’s shore–
A wilderness of faces dim,
And pale ones gashed and hoar.
A smiting sun. No shed, no tree;
He totters to his lair–
A den that sick hands dug in earth
Ere famine wasted there,
Or, dropping in his place, he swoons,
Walled in by throngs that press,
Till forth from the throngs they bear
him dead–
Dead in his meagreness.
(Herman Melville)
More Poetry from Herman Melville:
Herman Melville Poems based on Topics: Mind, Faces, World, Nature, Place, Brain- Bridegroom Dick (Herman Melville Poems)
- The Haglets (Herman Melville Poems)
- The Victor Of Antietam (Herman Melville Poems)
- Stonewall Jackson (Ascribed To A Virginian) (Herman Melville Poems)
- A Meditation (Herman Melville Poems)
- On The Slain Collegians (Herman Melville Poems)
Readers Who Like This Poem Also Like:
Based on Topics: World Poems, Mind Poems, Nature Poems, Faces Poems, Place Poems, Brain PoemsBased on Keywords: palisades, meagreness
- The Wild Knight (Gilbert Keith Chesterton Poems)
- Mogg Megone - Part I. (John Greenleaf Whittier Poems)
- Alma; or, The Progress of the Mind. In Three Cantos. - Canto I. (Matthew Prior Poems)
- A Story Of Plantagenet (Nora Pembroke Poems)
- Birdofredum Sawin; Esq., To Mr. Hosea Biglow (2) (James Russell Lowell Poems)