THOU sign-post of the Desert! Obelisk, Once fronting in thy monumental pride Egypt's fierce sun, that blazing far and wide, Sheared her of tree and herb, till like a disk Her waste stretched shadowless, and fraught with risk To those who with their beasts of burden hied Across the seas of sand until they spied Thy pillar, and their flagging hearts grew brisk: Now reared beside our Thames so wintry gray, Where blocks of ice drift with the drifting stream, Thou risest o'er the alien prospect! Say, Yon dull, blear, rayless orb whose lurid gleam Tinges the snow-draped ships and writhing steam, Is this the sun which fired thine orient day? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...GEOMETRY IS THE MIND OF GOD by JAMES GALVIN THE LAST REDOUBT by ALFRED AUSTIN BY THE ALMA RIVER by DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK CHILD AND MOTHER by EUGENE FIELD THE STIRRUP-CUP by JOHN MILTON HAY TO MRS. THRALE [ON HER COMPLETING HER THIRTY-FIFTH YEAR] by SAMUEL JOHNSON (1709-1784) IMAGINATION, FR. A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE |