| James and Mary Ford, eds. Every Day in the Year. 1902. | | | | January 22 | | A Threnody | | By George Thomas Lanigan |
| | | WHAT, what, what, | |
| What’s the news from Swat? | |
| Sad news, | |
| Bad news, | |
| Comes by the cable led | 5 |
| Through the Indian Ocean’s bed, | |
| Through the Persian Gulf, the Red | |
| Sea and the Med— | |
| Iterranean—he’s dead: | |
| The Ahkoond is dead! | 10 |
| |
| For the Ahkoond I mourn,— | |
| Who wouldn’t? | |
| He strove to disregard the message stern, | |
| But he Ahkoodn’t. | |
| |
| Dead, dead, dead, | 15 |
| Sorrow Swats! | |
| Shats wha hae wi’ Ahkoond bled, | |
| Swats whom he hath often led | |
| Onward to a gory bed, | |
| Or to victory, | 20 |
| As the case might be, | |
| Sorrow Swats! | |
| Tears shed, | |
| Shed tears like water: | |
| Your great Ahkoond is dead! | 25 |
| That Swats the matter! | |
| |
| Mourn, city of Swat! | |
| Your great Ahkoond is not, | |
| But laid mid worms to rot,— | |
| His mortal part alone:—his soul was caught | 30 |
| (Because he was a good Ahkoond) | |
| Up to the bosom of Mahound. | |
| Though earthy walls his frame surround, | |
| (Forever hallowed be the ground!) | |
| And skeptics mock the lowly mound | 35 |
| And say “He’s now of no Ahkoond!” | |
| His soul is in the skies— | |
| The azure skies that bend above his loved | |
| Metropolis of Swat. | |
| He sees with larger, other eyes | 40 |
| Athwart all earthly mysteries— | |
| He knows what’s Swat. | |
| Let Swat bury the great Ahkoond | |
| With a noise of mourning and of lamentation! | |
| Let Swat bury the great Ahkoond | 45 |
| With the noise of the mourning of the Swattish nation! | |
| |
| Fallen is at length | |
| Its tower of strength: | |
| Its sun is dimmed ere it had nooned: | |
| Dead lies the great Ahkoond, | 50 |
| The great Ahkoond of Swat | |
| Is not! | | | | |
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