And I laugh to see them whirl and flee, Like a swarm of golden bees, When I widen the rent in my tent, wind-built Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas, Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high, Are each paved with the moon and these. V. I bind the sun's throne with the burning zone, And the moon's with a girdle of pearl; The volcanoes are dim, and the stars reel and swim, When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl. From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape, Over a torrent sea, Sunbeam proof, I hang like a roof, The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march, With hurricane, fire, and snow, When the powers my chair, of the air are chained to Is the million-coloured bow; The sphere-fire above its soft colours wove, While the moist earth was laughing below. VI. I am the daughter of earth and water, I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores I change, but I cannot die. For after the rain, when with never a stain, The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams, Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. BY LORD BYRON. THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars in the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee. Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green, That host with their banners at sunset were seen: Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hain blown, That host on the morrow lay wither'd and strown. For the Angel of Death spread his wing on the blast, And breathed in the face of the foe as he pass'd; And the eyes and chill, of the sleepers wax'd deadly And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still! And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, But through it there roll'd not the breath of his pride; |