The Angel of Death | Page 4

water and earth and flame.
You build and dwell like the sparrows, building,
In sunny summer,
their fragile nest:
Securely feeling, in shady shielding,
They sing so
joyful in happy rest;
But sudden gust
Of the tempest shatters
The tiny crust
Of their
nest in tatters--
The merry song, heard so short before,
With grief is
silenced forevermore.
Like pigeons, cooing in anxious calling,
You sigh for morn, with
to-day not through,
When, unbethought, like a trap-door falling,


The earth unlocketh itself for you--
You disappear
Where no light is nearing--
Soon mem'ry dear
Is
no more endearing--
And new-lit moon, from its silvered sky,

Again, sees others arrive and fly.
In circling dances so lightly swinging
You follow wildly amusement's
thread,
With myrtle blooming and music ringing ...
But solemn I on
the threshold tread:--
The dance is checked
And the clang is wailing,
The wreath is
wrecked
And the bride is paling:
The end of splendor and joy and
might
Is only sorrow and tears and blight.
I am the mighty, who has the power,
Till yet a mightier shall appear.

In deepest pit, on the highest tower,
My chilling spirit is ever near:
Those plagues of night
And of desolation,
Whose breath of blight

May annul a nation,
They slay the victims, which I select,
Whom
shield and armor can not protect.
I wrap the wing round the polar tempest
And calm the waves ere they
reach the strand.
I crush the schemes of dynastic conquest,
And
wrench the club from the tyrant's hand.
I eras chase,
Like the hour just passing;
And race on race,
With
their works amassing,
Like heaving waves, in my footsteps flow,

Till, last, no ripples their murmur show.
'Gainst me in vain are your wit and letters,
'Gainst me nor weapons
nor arts prevail.
I freedom give to the slave in fetters,--
His ruler's
will I in irons nail.
I lead the battle--
And armies tumble,
Like slaughtered cattle,

While cannons rumble,
And never rise from their sudden fall
Until
alarmed by the judgment-call.

I wave my hand--and, with whirlwinds' sweeping
All life on earth to
that place doth fly,
Where not a sound to the ear is creeping,
Where
not a tongue moves to make reply.
My foot meanders--
And kings and heroes,
And Alexanders,
And
wicked Neros,
And princes, lofty in might and lust,
Are all
transformed to--a handful dust.
In lowly earth, upon which they bother
And beg and wrangle for rank
and gift,
I mix the races among each other,
I lay the centuries, drift
on drift.
Forlorn and friendless
Exists no pleasure;
In shadows endless
No
pomp, or treasure.
Their owners left them when on came night--

Now others claim them, with lawful right.
There is no stronghold on earth erected,
No guarded fort, that can
save you, known.
Though by recorded transfer protected,
Your
gained possession is not your own:
The purple hems
Of your silk-robed neighbor,
The crape, the gems,

And the yoke of labor,
Lo, other mortals their folds adorn,
On
other shoulders their loads are borne!
You have arrived, you shall part in pity;
You have not here either
house or home.
You soon shall dwell in that narrow city,
Where sun
and moon never lit the dome;
Where crest and foil
At the gate shall crumble--
And, from his toil,

Be released the humble;
Where captives' fetters, and love's sweet
band,
Shall, fragile, break by the same strong hand.
Where is your wife, and where is your mother?--
Then they have
wandered away that road,
Whence none returneth to greet another,

The foot-path, soon, to _your_ last abode....

Take tender care of
The charge God left thee,
Ere, unaware of,
It
be bereft thee,
Before your eyes nevermore to mount,
Till for its
keeping you shall account!
"Where is your brother? Where is your equal?"
Will _then_ be
questions too late to heed.
You _then_ find brethren--such is the
sequel--
You spiteful rich, in the worms you feed!
And when they fattened,
Like you, expire,
A reptile battened

Shall growth acquire,
Whose stings and gnawing shall never cease.

Upon your conscience, devoid of peace.
For you it waits, you, whose greed is preying
On mishap's victims, on
joy forlorn;
Who, faith and country alike betraying,
The good
deride and the sacred scorn;
Who, laws repressing
And hearts decoying,
Are virtue's blessing,

For fun, destroying--
And woe is fun's and derision's prize,
When,
pale, the phantoms of vengeance rise.
For you it waits, all ye lying spirits,
When, stiff, the tongue to the
palate sticks.
Your tongue would poison all honest merits,
Defiling
honor by artful tricks;--
But, at my bar,
There is no demurrer:
The tomb I spar,
And I gag
the slurrer,--
Who next thereafter, when speech is past,
To _Him_
shall answer, who judges last!
Then search, with rigor, your minds' desire,
Then probe, in tremor,
your souls' intent;
With hands and hearts clean and pure, aspire
To
_Him_ who knows what, within, you meant.
Yet, thither, mortals,
Your way is wending,
Where, on the portals,

Till time be ending,
There stands this sentence, without reprieve:

Here all shall enter--and none shall leave!

The earth devours you, with your achievements,
And locks together
its jaws again,
If by beneficence, or bereavements,
You cheered, or
injured, your fellow men--
But of this earth
Do not ask your measure;
For, if in dearth,
Or if
blest with treasure,
Your past, your present, what hence befall
_He_
only knoweth, Who knoweth all.
What God requires of man, He told thee;
He meted out, for