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Classic and Contemporary Poetry
KING PHILIP, by ANONYMOUS First Line: On pokanoket's height / all life is hushed beneath the summer heat Last Line: And told his wrongs in words that still we see / recorded on the page of history Subject(s): "mount Hope, Rhode Island;philip, King (native American Chief);" Metacomet;king Philip's War (1675-76) | |||
ON Pokanoket's height All life is hushed beneath the summer heat; No human step is heard from morn to night, And echo can repeat Naught but the lonely fish-hawk's piercing screams, As swooping downward to the placid bay, To touch the water's breast he scarcely seems, Then slow flies homeward with his struggling prey, Where mate and clamorous young hang eager o'er Their nest upon the blasted sycamore. You little grove of trees Waves soundless in the breeze That wanders down the slope; Hushed by the countless memories Which cluster round thy crest, renowned Mount Hope. How fair the scene! The city's gleaming spires, the clustering towns, The modest villages, half hid in green, Soft hills and grassy downs, The dark-blue waves of Narragansett Bay, Flecked with the snowflakes of an hundred sail, And, southward, in the distance, cold and gray, Newport lies sleeping in her foggy veil. Beyond the eastern waves, Where Taunton River laves The harbor's sandy edges, Queen of a thousand iron slaves, Fall River nestles in her granite ledges. When here King Philip stood, Or rested in the niche we call his throne, He looked o'er hill and vale and swelling flood, Which once were all his own. Before the white man's footstep, day by day, As the sea-tides encroach upon the sand, He saw his proud possessions melt away, And found himself a king without a land. Constrained by unknown laws, Judged guilty without cause, Maddened by treachery, What wonder that his tortured spirit rose, And turned upon his foes, And told his wrongs in words that still we see Recorded on the page of history. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...MOUNT HOPE by WILLIAM AUGUSTUS CROFFUT THE LAMENTABLE BALLAD OF BLOODY BROOK by EDWARD EVERETT HALE THE GREAT SWAMP FIGHT by CAROLINE HAZARD THE SUDBURY FIGHT by WALLACE RICE KING PHILIP'S LAST STAND by CLINTON SCOLLARD ON A FORTIFICATION AT BOSTON BEGUN BY WOMEN by BENJAMIN TOMPSON METACOM by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER TIS A LITTLE JOURNEY by ANONYMOUS "'TIS MIDNIGHT, AND THE SETTING SUN" by ANONYMOUS |
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