Saul
1
- Thou whose spell can raise the dead,
- Bid the prophets form appear.
- Samuel, raise thy buried head!
- King, behold the phantom seer!
- Earth yawnd; he stood the centre of a cloud:
- Light changed its hue, retiring from his shroud.
- Death stood all glassy in the fixed eye:
- His hand was withered, and his veins were dry;
- His foot, in bony whiteness, glitterd there,
- Shrunken and sinewless, and ghastly bare;
- From lips that moved not and unbreathing frame,
- Like cavernd winds the hollow acccents came.
- Saul saw, and fell to earth, as falls the oak,
- At once, and blasted by the thunder-stroke.
2
- Why is my sleep disquieted?
- Who is he that calls the dead?
- Is it thou, Oh King? Behold
- Bloodless are these limbs, and cold:
- Such are mine; and such shall be
- Thine, to-morrow, when with me:
- Ere the coming day is done,
- Such shalt thou be, such thy son.
- Fare thee well, but for a day,
- Then we mix our mouldering clay.
- Thou, thy race, lie pale and low,
- Pierced by shafts of many a bow;
- And the falchion by thy side,
- To thy heart, thy hand shall guide:
- Crownless, breathless, headless fall,
- Son and sire, the house of Saul!
|