AFTER A THOUSAND YEARS by CHARLES MARIE RENE LECONTE DE LISLE

THAT night the loud voice of the sea was roaring
Wroth in the darkened gullies' rocky cup,
And, all dishevelled, clouds of mist were pouring
Where round the headlands the whipt spume rose up.

The howling wind smote all the shades asunder
And tore them on the cliff-tops; savagely
With bellowing fury as of taurine thunder
It drove the herded breakers of the sea.

Like an enormous monster, frenzy-driven,
With bristling hide and mouth afoam with wrath,
The mountain rearing in the embattled heaven
Moaned dreadfully, its loins white with froth.

Rapt by the desperate cries, I heard more loudly,
O Vision, O Desire, O Life new-born!
In the wild air your holy songs that proudly
Called to me like the trumpeters of morn.

And forth from the infernal cavern reeking
My soul escaped from darkness and dire drouth,
Into the feverish air of life, still seeking
For Glory's laurel and for Beauty's mouth.

And thus the dreadful night's loud voice spake to me:
"Lo! Life is sweet. Burst thou thy sepulchre!"
And the mad wind with its wild notes and gloomy:
"Let Beauty draw thy being into her!"

And I who seek this boon of hours appalling
After a buried century of decades,
Hear nothing but these savage tears down falling,
The muffled onset of embattled shades.

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