O'ER this huge town, rife with intestine wars, Whence as from monstrous sacrificial shrines Pillars of smoke climb heavenward, Night inclines Black brows majestical with glimmering stars. Her dewy silence soothes life's angry jars: And like a mother's wan white face, who pines Above her children's turbulent ways, so shines The moon athwart the narrow cloudy bars. Now toiling multitudes that hustling crush Each other in the fateful strife for breath And, hounded on by diverse hungers, rush Across the prostrate ones that groan beneath, Are swathed within the universal hush, As life exchanges semblances with death. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE WILLOWS by FRANCIS BRET HARTE TO THE UNKNOWN EROS: BOOK 1: 8. DEPARTURE by COVENTRY KERSEY DIGHTON PATMORE UPON WEDLOCK, AND DEATH OF CHILDREN by EDWARD TAYLOR A CURSE FOR A NATION: THE CURSE by ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING A POETICAL VERSION OF A LETTER, FROM THE EARL OF ESSEX TO SOUTHAMPTON by JOHN BYROM |