LIKE bodiless water passing in a sigh, Thro' palsied streets the fatal shadows flow, And in their sharp disastrous undertow Suck in the morning sun, and all the sky. The towery vista sinks upon the eye, As if it heard the Hebrew bugles blow, Black and dissolved; nor could the founders know How what was built so bright should daily die. Thy mood with man's is broken and blent in, City of Stains! and ache of thought doth drown The primitive light in which thy life began; Great as thy dole is, smirched with his sin, Greater and elder yet the love of man Full in thy look, tho' the dark visor's down. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ABOVE AND WITHIN by DAVID IGNATOW MIDDLE-AGED; A STUDY IN EMOTION by EZRA POUND STROLLER by WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS ASTROPHEL AND STELLA: 39 by PHILIP SIDNEY THE QUEEN IN FRANCE; AN ANCIENT SCOTTISH BALLAD by WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE AYTOUN FRAGMENTS INTENDED FOR DEATH'S JEST-BOOK: COUNTENANCE FOREBODING EVIL by THOMAS LOVELL BEDDOES |