I am the Smoke King, I am black! I am swinging in the sky, I am wringing worlds on awry; I am the thought of the throbbing mills, I am the soul of the soul-toil kills, Wraithe of the ripple of trading rills, Up I'm curling from the sod, I am whirling home to God. I am the Smoke King, I am black. I am the Smoke King, I am black! I am wreathing broken hearts, I am sheathing love's light darts; Inspiration of iron times, Wedding the toil of toiling climes, Shedding the blood of bloodless crimes -- Lurid lowering 'mid the blue, Torrid towering toward the true, I am the Smoke King, I am black. I am the Smoke King, I am black! I am darkening with song, I am hearkening to wrong! I will be black as blackness can -- The blacker the mantle the mightier the man! For blackness was ancient ere whiteness began. I am daubing God in night, I am swabbing Hell in white: I am the Smoke King, I am black. I am the Smoke King, I am black! I am cursing ruddy morn, I am nursing hearts unborn: Souls unto me are as stars in the night, I whiten my black men -- I beckon my white! What's the hue of a hide to a man in his might? Hail, great, gritty, grimy hands -- Sweet Christ, pity toiling lands! I am the Smoke King, I am black. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...TO YOUTH by WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR THE RUBAIYAT, 1879 EDITION: 17 by OMAR KHAYYAM ODES I, 5 by QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS MAN FRAIL AND GOD ETERNAL by ISAAC WATTS TO THE MAN-OF-WAR-BIRD by WALT WHITMAN UNPERFECTED by LOUISA SARAH BEVINGTON NIAGARA by JOHN GARDINER CALKINS BRAINARD THE STRING AROUND MY FINGER by JOHN GARDINER CALKINS BRAINARD |