BEFORE us in the sultry dawn arose Indigo-tinted mountains; and ere noon We near'd an isle that lay like a festoon, And shar'd the ocean's glittering repose. We saw plantations spotted with white huts; Estates midst orange groves and towering trees; Rich yellow lawns embrown'd by soft degrees; Plots of intense gold freak'd with shadynuts. A dead hot silence tranced sea, land, and sky: And now a long canoe came gliding forth, Wherein there sat an old man fierce and swarth, Tiger-faced, black-fang'd, and with jaundiced eye. Pure white, with pale blue chequer'd, and red fold Of head-cloth 'neath straw brim, this Master wore; While in the sun-glare stood with high-rais'd oar A naked Image all of burnish'd gold. Golden his bones -- high-valued in the mart, His minted muscles, and his glossy skin; Golden his life of action -- but within The slave is human in a bleeding heart. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...BROTHERHOOD by GEORGIA DOUGLAS JOHNSON VICTORY BELLS by GRACE HAZARD CONKLING THE LITTLE PEACH by EUGENE FIELD GERANIUMS by WILFRID WILSON GIBSON A NICE CORRESPONDENT by FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON IN APRIL by MARGARET LEE ASHLEY PROFITABLE THINGS by WILLIAM ROSE BENET VERSES ON CLERGY PREACHING POLITICS by JOHN BYROM SPECIAL MESSAGE TO THE VERMONT LEGISLATURE by DANIEL LEAVENS CADY |