Silent they gaze from Ilion's battlements - Yon sail to-day has brought her latest foe; Silent they gaze upon the plain below, And hear glad voices from the Grecian tents: Not now Achilles, shouting from the trench, Dismays them - but that friend of Hercules, Armed with the Hydra's blood to fight for Greece, Though once deported for his rueful stench; The cruel shafts will soon be on the wing, So brief is that beleaguered city's span; The leech has gone to that ill-savoured man: The foot of Philoctetes yearns to spring Like young Protesilaus! Troy hath learned Her fate, - the ten-years' exile hath returned! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MODERN LOVE: 30 by GEORGE MEREDITH AFTERNOON ON A HILL by EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY THE SEA by BRYAN WALLER PROCTER A SUMMER NIGHT by JOHANNA AMBROSIUS ODE TO THE CONNECTICUT RIVER by JOSIAS LYNDON ARNOLD A MODERN SAPPHO by MATTHEW ARNOLD IN JUNIOR YEAR by WILLIAM GRANT BARNEY A FAVOURITE SCENE; RECALLED ON LOOKING AT BIRKET FOSTER'S LANDSCAPE by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN |