| |
| THE NIGHT was on the world, and in my sleep | |
| I heard a voice that cried across the dark: | |
| “Give steel!” And gazing I beheld a red, | |
| Infernal stithy. There were Titans five | |
| Assembled, thewed and naked and malign | 5 |
| Against the glare. One to the furnace throat, | |
| Whence issued screams, fed shapes of human use— | |
| The hammer, axe and plow. Those molten soon, | |
| Another haled the dazzling ingot forth | |
| With tongs, and gave it to the anvil. Two, | 10 |
| With massy sledges throbbing at the task, | |
| Harried the gloom with unenduring stars | |
| And poured a clangorous music on the dark, | |
| With loud, astounding shock and counter-shock | |
| Incessant. And the fifth colossus stood | 15 |
| The captain of that labor. From his form | |
| Spread wings more black than Hell’s high-altar—ribbed | |
| As are the vampire-bat’s. The night grew old, | |
| And I was then aware they shaped a sword.… | |
| |
| In that domain and interval of dream | 20 |
| ’Twas dawn upon the headlands of the world, | |
| And I, appalled, beheld how men had reared | |
| A mountain, dark below the morning star— | |
| A peak made up of houses and of herds, | |
| Of cradles, yokes and all the handiwork | 25 |
| Of man. Upon its crest were gems and gold, | |
| Rare fabrics, and the woof of humble looms. | |
| Harvests and groves and battlements were made | |
| Part of its ramparts, and the whole was drenched | |
| With oil and wine and honey. Then thereon | 30 |
| Men bound their sons, the fair, alert and strong, | |
| Sparing no household. And when all were bound, | |
| Brands were brought forth: the mount became a pyre. | |
| Black from that red immensity of flame, | |
| A tower of smoke, upcoiling to the sky, | 35 |
| Was shapen by the winds, and took the form | |
| Of him who in the stithy gave command. | |
| A shadow between day and men he stood; | |
| His eyes looked forth on nothingness; his wings | |
| Domed desolations, and the scarlet sun | 40 |
| Glowed through their darkness like a seal that God | |
| Might set on Hell forever. Then the pyre | |
| Shrank, and he reeled. Whereat, to save that shape | |
| Their madness had evoked in death and pain, | |
| Men rose and made a second sacrifice. | 45 |
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