Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE WATCHERS, by CLINTON SCOLLARD


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE WATCHERS, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: With eerie cadence hoots the owl
Last Line: The lions wait and watch the hour!
Subject(s): Ancestry & Ancestors; Animals; Lions


WITH eerie cadence hoots the owl;
The moon is on her silver throne;
(The lions peer, the lions prowl,
About the pillars proud or prone.)

From desert wastes an ancient song
Upon the wind drifts out and in;
(The lions they are lean and long
And sly and sinuous as sin.)

Enscrolled entablature and plinth
Are shattered or are toppled things;
(The lions search each labyrinth
Above the swathed dust of kings.)

Here sounded once the Luxor lyre,
Or high flutes shrilled the Theban lay;
(The lions are man's fell desire
To grasp, to gain, to filch, to prey.)

Here Joy was fluent as are birds,
Or like a lissome stripling ran;
(The lions are the lying words
That undermine man's faith in man.)

Here there were warlike triumphs; here
Of old the whole world made its mart;
(The lions are those forms of fear
That batten upon Honor's heart.)

And shall the stature of our state
To shards be riven thus and rent?
(The lions, greed reincarnate,
Are evil's base embodiment.)

We can but strive, beseech, implore,
For faith, for foresight, and for power,
Since ever, beside gate and door,
The lions wait and watch the hour!





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