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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE SUNIAN PALLAS by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL

First Line: BY SUNIAN'S ROCK I TOOK MY WAY
Last Line: "GO, FIGHT, AND WIN THE CONQUEROR'S REST."
Subject(s): SOUNION (CAPE), GREECE; COLONNA; SUNIUM;
BY Sunium's rock I took my way
Along the blue AEgean sea,
That bright in golden sunset lay
Round the fair islands of the free:
A form of more than mortal mould
On the high rock sublimely rose;
The bosses of her buckler rolled
Like eyes of lightning on her foes:
I looked, -- the blue-eyed goddess there
Stood glorious in the evening air.

She stood and raised her brazen lance,
That glittered like a meteor's beam;
Its light below in quivering dance
Flashed gayly on the ocean stream:
Round her tall casque her plumy crest
Shook with a terrible sign of power,
And the grim AEgis on her breast
Told to the Turk his destined hour;
She spake, -- and like the rush of flame
Her voice in awful murmurs came.

"Sons, worthy of your warrior sires!
Yours is the cause of earth and heaven.
Shame to the heart that faints or tires,
Till the last sacrifice is given!
Go fearlessly along your path, --
It mounts to liberty and fame;
Go, with an unrelenting wrath,
And conquer till the Turk is tame;
When the red fires of battle glare,
Remember, -- I am with ye there.

"These rocks that rise so rudely round
Were consecrate to me of old;
Here the Athenian sternly bound,
For rapid fight, his mantle's fold:
He saw the Persian tents below;
They filled and blackened all the plain;
He rushed, -- and like a torrent's flow,
Swept them, and hurled them to the main:
This was the wrath that made him free,
The fearless wrath of liberty.

"What if a cold and coward world
Leave ye to work your way alone,
Be the new banner never furled
Till liberty is all our own.
Tell them we ask no other aid
Than our own hearts in such a cause;
No, none but Freemen's hands were made
To fight and win for equal laws.
Go, with a firm, confiding breast, --
Go, fight, and win the conqueror's rest."



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