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Classic and Contemporary Poetry


THE STEAM THRESHING-MACHINE (CONTINUED) by CHARLES TENNYSON TURNER

First Line: DID ANY SEER OF ANCIENT TIME FOREBODE
Last Line: LOW-BOOMING WITH THE PROPHECY OF STEAM!
Subject(s): HARVEST; MACHINERY AND MACHINISTS;

Did any seer of ancient time forebode
This mighty engine, which we daily see
Accepting our full harvests, like a god,
With clouds about his shoulders, - it might be
Some poet-husbandman, some lord of verse,
Old Hesiod, or the wizard Mantuan
Who catalogued in rich hexameters
The Rake, the Roller, and the mystic Van:
Or else some priest of Ceres, it might seem,
Who witnessed, as he trod the silent fane,
The notes and auguries of coming change,
Of other ministrants in shrine and grange, -
The sweating statute, and her sacred wain
Low-booming with the prophecy of steam!



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