Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ATHEISM: ANNIHILATION, by ELIZABETH OAKES PRINCE SMITH


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ATHEISM: ANNIHILATION, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Doubt, cypress crowned, upon a ruined arch
Last Line: And silence claims again her region cold and drear.
Alternate Author Name(s): Smith, Seba (e. Oakes), Mrs.; Oakes-smith, Elizabeth
Subject(s): Death; Earth; Love; Sleep; Dead, The; World


Doubt, cypress crowned, upon a ruined arch
Amid the shapely temple overthrown,
Exultant, stays at length her onward march:
Her victim, all with earthliness o'ergrown,
Hath sunk himself to earth to perish there;
His thoughts are outward, all his love a blight,
Dying, deluding, are his hopes, though fair --
And death, the spirit's everlasting night.
Thus, midnight travellers, on some mountain steep
Hear far above the avalanche boom down,
Starting the glacier echoes from their sleep,
And lost in glens to human foot unknown --
The death-plunge of the lost come to their ear,
And silence claims again her region cold and drear.





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


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