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Home  »  library  »  poem  »  The Dawning of the Day

C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

The Dawning of the Day

By James Clarence Mangan (1803–1849)

’TWAS a balmy summer morning,

Warm and early,

Such as only June bestows;

Everywhere the earth adorning,

Dews lay pearly

In the lily-bell and rose.

Up from each green-leafy bosk and hollow

Rose the blackbird’s pleasant lay;

And the soft cuckoo was sure to follow:

’Twas the dawning of the day!

Through the perfumed air the golden

Bees flew round me;

Bright fish dazzled from the sea,

Till medreamt some fairy olden-

World spell bound me

In a trance of witcherie.

Steeds pranced round anon with stateliest housings,

Bearing riders prankt in rich array,

Like flushed revelers after wine-carousings:

’Twas the dawning of the day!

Then a strain of song was chanted,

And the lightly

Floating sea-nymphs drew anear.

Then again the shore seemed haunted

By hosts brightly

Clad, and wielding shield and spear!

Then came battle shouts—an onward rushing—

Swords, and chariots, and a phantom fray.

Then all vanished: the warm skies were blushing

In the dawning of the day!

Cities girt with glorious gardens,

Whose immortal

Habitants in robes of light

Stood, methought, as angel-wardens

Nigh each portal,

Now arose to daze my sight.

Eden spread around, revived and blooming;

When—lo! as I gazed, all passed away:

I saw but black rocks and billows looming

In the dim chill dawn of day!