The Wild Knight and Other Poems | Page 9

while his robes were gory;
And Hoham of Hebron, whose loathly
face is
Heavy and dark o'er the ruin of races;
And Piram of Jarmuth,
drunk with strange wine,
Who dreamed he had fashioned all stars that
shine;
And Debir of Eglon wild, without pity,
Who raged like a
plague in the midst of his city;
And Japhia of Lachish, a fire that
flameth,
Who did in the daylight what no man nameth.
These five kings said one to another,
'King unto king o'er the world is
brother,
Seeing that now, for a sign and a wonder,
A red eclipse and
a tongue of thunder,
A shape and a finger of desolation,
Is come
against us a kingless nation.
Gibeon hath failed us: it were not good

That a man remember where Gibeon stood.'
Then Gibeon sent to
our captain, crying,
'Son of Nun, let a shaft be flying,
For unclean
birds are gathering greedily;
Slack not thy hand, but come thou
speedily.
Yea, we are lost save thou maintain'st us,
For the kings of
the mountains are gathered against us.'
Then to our people spake the Deliverer,
'Gibeon is high, yet a host
may shiver her;
Gibeon hath sent to me crying for pity,
For the
lords of the cities encompass the city
With chariot and banner and
bowman and lancer,
And I swear by the living God I will answer.


Gird you, O Israel, quiver and javelin,
Shield and sword for the road
we travel in;
Verily, as I have promised, pay I
Life unto Gibeon,

death unto Ai.'
Sudden and still as a bolt shot right
Up on the city we went by night.

Never a bird of the air could say,
'This was the children of Israel's
way.'
Only the hosts sprang up from sleeping,
Saw from the heights a dark
stream sweeping;
Sprang up straight as a great shout stung them,

And heard the Deliverer's war-cry among them,
Heard under cupola,
turret, and steeple
The awful cry of the kingless people.
Started the weak of them, shouted the strong of them,
Crashed we a
thunderbolt into the throng of them,
Blindly with heads bent, and
shields forced before us,
We heard the dense roar of the strife closing
o'er us.
And drunk with the crash of the song that it sung them,
We
drove the great spear-blade in God's name among them.
Redder and redder the sword-flash fell.
Our eyes and our nostrils
were hotter than hell;
Till full all the crest of the spear-surge shocking
us,
Hoham of Hebron cried out mocking us,
'Nay, what need of the
war-sword's plying,
Out of the desert the dust comes flying.
A little
red dust, if the wind be blowing--
Who shall reck of its coming or
going?'
Back the Deliverer spake as a clarion,
'Mock at thy slaves,
thou eater of carrion!
Laughest thou at us, in thy kingly clowning,

We, that laughed upon Ramases frowning.
We that stood up proud,
unpardoned,
When his face was dark and his heart was hardened?

Pharaoh we knew and his steeds, not faster
Than the word of the Lord
in thine ear, O master.
Sheer through the turban his wantons wove him,
Clean to the skull
the Deliverer clove him;
And the two hosts reeled at the sign
appalling,
As the great king fell like a great house falling.
Loudly we shouted, and living and dying.
Bore them all backward
with strength and strong crying;
And Caleb struck Zedek hard at the

throat,
And Japhia of Lachish Zebulon smote.
The war-swords and
axes were clashing and groaning,
The fallen were fighting and
foaming and moaning;
The war-spears were breaking, the war-horns
were braying,
Ere the hands of the slayers were sated with slaying.

And deep in the grasses grown gory and sodden,
The treaders of all
men were trampled and trodden;
And over them, routed and reeled
like cattle,
High over the turn of the tide of the battle,
High over
noises that deafen and cover us,
Rang the Deliverer's voice out over
us.
'Stand thou still, thou sun upon Gibeon,
Stand thou, moon, in the
valley of Ajalon!
Shout thou, people, a cry like thunder,
For the
kings of the earth are broken asunder.
Now we have said as the
thunder says it,
Something is stronger than strength and slays it.

Now we have written for all time later,
Five kings are great, yet a law
is greater.
Stare, O sun! in thine own great glory,
This is the turn of
the whole world's story.
Stand thou still, thou sun upon Gibeon,

Stand thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon!
'Smite! amid spear-blades blazing and breaking.
More than we know
of is rising and making.
Stab with the javelin, crash with the car!

Cry! for we know not the thing that we are.
Stand, O sun! that in
horrible patience
Smiled on the smoke and the slaughter of nations.

Thou shalt grow sad for a little crying,
Thou shalt be darkened for
one man's dying--
Stand thou still, thou sun upon Gibeon,
Stand
thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon!'
After the battle was broken and spent
Up to the hill the Deliverer
went,
Flung up his arms to the storm-clouds flying,
And cried unto
Israel, mightily crying,
'Come up, O warriors! come up, O brothers!

Tribesmen and herdsmen, maidens and mothers;
The bondman's
son and the bondman's daughter,
The hewer