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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


TWO AUTUMN DAWNS: 2 by JOHN GOULD FLETCHER

First Line: THE CITY IS ASTIR ERE DAWN HAS COME
Last Line: THE CITY IS ASTIR, ERE DAWN HAS COME.
Subject(s): AUTUMN; DAWN; LONDON; SEASONS; FALL; SUNRISE;

The City is astir ere Dawn has come,
She has arisen, shaken herself from sleep,
And over all her pinnacles surges deep
The noise of life, in a reverberant hum.
The Summer dream is over: wake, O wake,
You gemmed Aladdin caverns of long nights!
Let lamps into the Dawn their long hair shake,
And let the roaring streets o'erflow with lights!
Let the wind-shuttles, on the chimney looms,
Weave the great web of smoke, which, cast afar,
Blots from our ken each planet, every star.
Let Dawn be lost within those glittering glooms.
For Winter, which makes Nature stiff and dumb,
Fills man with his heroic dream of old:
With all his surging fevered search for gold
The City is astir, ere dawn has come.



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