IN lands where only jackals call, And only vulture-shadows fall Day-long, beside a city wall, Did this betide. 'Twas night; the sands were camel-strewn; Around me was a world unknown; Far off the drifted desert blown, A bugle died. I felt dim shapes of thought arise, Which turn to stone the human eyes That long have gazed on desert skies, Far from mankind; Grim mammoth things that come unbid, In the great pit of being hid, Kin to the Sphinx and Pyramid, Unhinged my mind. Grotesque enchantments that begin In motions of the twisted drin, Wound in my senses, and within My spirit stirred; The desert magic o'er me drew Cast skins of nature she outgrew, Worn in the time she man foreknew In beast and bird. I seemed a creature strange, apart, Crept from a crevice of the heart Of things, -- to come and to depart, -- A foot, a face; There, peering in my hour of light Upon the centuries' ageless flight, I held the whole world on my sight, -- All time, all space. One moment, robed in starry air, As 'twere a spangled leopard there, I crouched, -- and slipped back unaware Into all things; As when the phoenix melts in flame, The soul of matter went and came, And in one throb great nature's frame Folded its wings. How dark it was, when I came back Along the spiritual track To my own world! how mortal black The city wall, -- The forms of men like shadows seen, Sleeping the camel-heaps between, Unconscious of the spectral scene, The jackal's call! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...CHILDREN by WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR TWILIGHT AT THE HEIGHTS by CINCINNATUS HEINE MILLER MY MADONNA by ROBERT WILLIAM SERVICE BEAUREGARD by CATHERINE ANNE WARFIELD THE FLITCH OF BACON: MY OLD COMPLAINT (ITS CAUSE AND CURE) by WILLIAM HARRISON AINSWORTH |