I HAD a vision at that mystic hour,
When in the ebon garden of the Night,
Blooms the Cimmerian flower
Of doubt and darkness, cowering from the light.
I seemed to stand on a vast lonely height,
Above a city ravished and o’erthrown,
The air about me one long moan
Of lamentation like a dreary sea
Scourged by the storm to murmurous weariness;
Then, from dim levels of mist-folded ground
Borne upward suddenly.
Burst the deep-rolling stress
Of jubilant drums, blent with the silvery sound
Of long-drawn bugle notes–the clash of swords
(Outflashed by alien lords)–
And warrior-voices wild with victory.
They could not quell the grieved and shuddering air,
That breathed about me its forlorn despair:
It almost seemed as if stern Triumph sped
To one whose hopes were dead,
And flaunting there his fortune’s ruddier grace,
Smote–with a taunt–wan Misery in the face!
Lo! far away,
(For now my dream grows clear as luminous day,)
The victor’s camp-fires gird the city round;
But she, unrobed, discrowned–
A new Andromeda, beside the main
Of her own passionate pain;
Bowed, naked, shivering low–
Veils the soft gleam of melancholy eyes,
Yet lovelier in their woe,–
Alike from hopeless earth and hopeless skies.
No Perseus, for her sake, serenely fleet,
Shall cleave the heavens with winged and shining feet:–
Ah me! the maid is lost–
For sorrow, like keen frost
Shall eat into her being’s anguished core–
Atlanta (not Andromeda in this),
What outside helper can bring back her bliss?
Call re-illume, beyond its storm-built bar,
Her youth’s auroral star,
Or wake the aspiring heart that sleeps forever more.
O! lying prophet of a sombre mood,
This city of our love
Is no poor, timorous dove,
To crouch and die unstruggling in the mire;
If, for a time, she yields to force and fire,
Blinded by battle-smoke, and drenched with blood,
Still must that dauntless hardihood
Drawn to her veins from out the iron hills,
(Nerving the brain that toils, the soul that wills,)
Shake off the lotus-languishment of grief!
I see her rise and clasp her old belief,
In God and goodness–with imperial glance,
Face the dark front of frowning Circumstance,–
While trusting only to her strong right arm
To wrench from deadly harm,
All civic blessings and fair fruits of peace!
High-souled to gain (despite her ravished years),
And dragon-forms of monstrous doubts and fears,
The matchless splendor of Toil’s “golden fleece!”
I see her rise, and strive with strenuous hands firmly to lay
The fresh foundations of a nobler sway–
War-wasted lands
Laden with ashes, gray and desolate–
Touched by the charm of some regenerate fate–
Flush into golden harvests prodigal;
Set by the steam-god’s fiery passion free,
I hear the rise and fall
Of ponderous iron-clamped machinery,
Shake, as with earthquake thrill, the factory halls;
While round the massive walls
Slow vapor, like a sinuous serpent steals–
Through which revolve in circles, great or small,
The deafening thunders of the tireless wheels!
Far down each busy mart
That throbs and heaves as with a human heart
Quick merchants pass, some debonair and gay,
With undimmed, youthful locks–
Some wrinkled, sombre, gray–
But all with one accord
Dreaming of him–their lord–
The mighty monarch of the realm of stocks!
And year by year her face more frankly bright,
Glows with the ardor of the bloodless fight
For bounteous empire o’er her cherished South.
More sweet the smile upon her maiden mouth,
Just rounding to rare curves of womanhood:
Because all unwithstood
The magic of her power and stately pride
Hath called from many a clime
Of tropic sunshine and of winter rime,
The world’s skilled art and science to her side;
Hence from her transient tomb,
Three lustra since, a hideous spot to see–
Grows the majestic tree
Of heightened and green-leaved prosperity.
Hence, her broad gardens bloom
With rose and lily, and all flowers of balm.
And hence above the lines
Of her vast railways, droop the laden vines–
A luscious largess thro’ the summer calm!
. . . . .
Feeling her veins so full of lusty blood,
That pulsed within them like a rhythmic flood,
And eager for sweet sisterhood,–the bond
Blissful and fond,
That yet may hold all nations in its thrall,
Atlanta–from a night of splendid dreams,
Roused by soft kisses of the morning beams,
Decreed a glorious festival
Of art and commerce in her brave domain;
She sent her summons on the courier breeze;
Or thro’ the lightning wing
(Paul Hamilton Hayne)
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Based on Topics: Love Poems, God Poems, World Poems, Night Poems, Light Poems, Mind Poems, Sadness Poems, Time Poems, Soul Poems, War & Peace Poems, Faces PoemsBased on Keywords: regenerate, ruddier, cimmerian, andromeda, atlanta, battle-smoke, re-illume, nerving, outflashed, unrobed, green-leaved