Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, A SONG OF CREATION: BOOK 3, CANTO 2, by CINCINNATUS HEINE MILLER


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

A SONG OF CREATION: BOOK 3, CANTO 2, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: This water town of tokio
Last Line: I did not hear that baby cry!
Alternate Author Name(s): Miller, Joaquin
Subject(s): Creation


I

This water town of Tokio
Is as a church with priests at prayer,
With restful silence everywhere,
Or night or day, or high or low.
You something hear a turtle dove,
A locust trilling from his tree
In chorus with his mated love,
May see a raven in the air,
Wide-winged and high, but even he
Is as a shadow in the stream,
As dreamful, silent as a dream.

II

They could but note the silent maids
That carried, with a mother's care,
The silent baby, ofttimes bare
As birthtime through their Caran shades.
Ten thousand babies, everywhere,
But not one wail, or day or night,
To put the locust's love to flight,
Or mar the chorus of the dove.
And why? Why, they were born of love:
Born soberly, born sanely, clean,
As Indian babes of old were born
Ere yet the white man's face was seen,
Ere yet the sensuous white man came;
Born clean as love, of lovelight born
Some long lost Rocky Mountain morn
Where snow-topt turrets first took flame
And flashed God's image in God's name!

III

Tell me, my flint-scarred pioneer,
My skin-clad Carson, mountaineer,
Who met red Sioux, met dusk Modoc,
Red hand to hand in battle shock
Where men but met to dare and die,
Did ever you once see or hear
One poor brown Indian baby cry?

IV

The long, hot march by ashen plain,
The burning trail by lava bed,
Babes lashed to back in corded pain
Until the swollen bare legs bled,
But on and on their mothers led,
If but to find a place to die.
Yet who, of all men that pursued
This dying race, year after year,
By burning plain or beetling wood,
Did ever see, did ever hear,
One bleeding Indian baby cry?

V

The starving mother's breasts were dry,
There scarce was time to stop and drink,
The swollen legs grew black as ink --
There was not even time to die.
And yet, through all this fifty year,
What hounding man did ever hear
One piteous Indian baby cry?

VI

Nay, they were born as men were born
Far back in Jacob's Bible morn;
Were born of love, born lovingly,
Unlike the fretful child of lust,
When love gat love and trust gat trust --
And trusting, dared to silent die
In torture and disdain a tear,
If mother willed, nor question why.
Yea, I have seen so many die,
This cruel, hard, half-hundred year,
And I have cried, to see, to hear --
But never heard one baby cry.

VII

Shot down in Castle Rocks I lay
One midnight, lay as one shot dead,
A lad, and lone, years, years of yore.
I heard deep Sacramento roar,
Saw Shasta glitter far away --
I never saw such moon before
And yet I could not turn my head,
Nor move my lips to cry or say.
Red arrows in both form and face
Held form and face tight pinned in place
Against the gnarled, black chaparral,
As one fast nailed against a wall
With scant half room to wholly fall --
The hot, thick, gurgling, gasping breath,
The thirst, the thirsting unto death!

VIII

And then a child against my feet
Crawled feebly and crept close to die;
I moaned, "Oh baby, won't you cry?
'Twould be as music piteous sweet
To hear in this dread place of death
Just one lorn cry, just one sweet breath
Of life, here 'mid the moonlit dead,
The mingled dead, white men and red.

IX

"Oh, bleeding, blood-red baby, cry
Just once before I, choking die!
And maybe some white man will hear
In yonder fortressed camp anear
And bring blest drink for you and I --
Oh, baby, please, please, baby, cry!"

X

A crackling in the chaparral
And then a lion in the clear
From which the dying babe had crept,
Swift as a yellow sunbeam, leapt
And stood so tall, so near, so near!
So cruel near, so sinuous, tall --
Some Landseer's picture on a wall.

XI

I never saw such length of limb,
Such arm as God had given him!
His paws, they swallowed up the earth,
His midnight eyes shot arrows out
The while his tail whipped swift about --
His tail was surely twice his girth!

XII

His nostrils wide with smell of blood
Reached out above us where he stood
And snuffed the dank, death-laden air
Till half his yellow teeth were bare.
His yellow length was bare and lank --
I never saw such hollow flank;
'Twas as a grave is, as a pall,
A flabby black flank -- scarce at all!

XIII

He sudden quivered, tail to jaws,
Crouched low, unsheathed his shining claws --
"Oh, baby, baby, won't you cry,
Just once before we two must die?"
I felt him spring, clutch up, then leap
Swift down the rock-built, broken steep;
I heard a crunch of bones, but I --
I did not hear that baby cry!





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net