<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=391612" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Indian City</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">What deep wounds ever clos'd without a scar?<br>The heart's bleed longest, and but heal to wear<br>That which disfigures it.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Childe Harold</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I</div><div style="margin:10px 0">ROYAL in splendour went down the day<br>On the plain where an Indian city lay,<br>With its crown of domes o'er the forest high,<br>Red as if fused in the burning sky,<br>And its deep groves pierced by the rays which made<br>A bright stream's way thro' each long arcade,<br>Till the pillar'd vaults of the Banian stood,<br>Like torch-lit aisles midst the solemn wood, <br>And the plantain glitter'd with leaves of gold,<br>As a tree midst the genii-gardens old,<br>And the cypress lifted a blazing spire,<br>And the stems of the cocoas were shafts of fire.<br>Many a white pagoda's gleam<br>Slept lovely round upon lake and stream,<br>Broken alone by the lotus-flowers,<br>As they caught the glow of the sun's last hours,<br>Like rosy wine in their cups, and shed<br>Its glory forth on their crystal bed.<br>Many a graceful Hindoo maid,<br>With the water-vase from the palmy shade,<br>Came gliding light as the desert's roe,<br>Down marble steps to the tanks below;<br>And a cool sweet plashing was ever heard,<br>As the molten glass of the wave was stirr'd;<br>And a murmur, thrilling the scented air,<br>Told where the Bramin bow'd in prayer. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">There wandered a noble Moslem boy<br>Through the scene of beauty in breathless joy;<br>He gazed where the stately city rose<br>Like a pageant of clouds in its red repose;<br>He turn'd where birds thro' the gorgeous gloom<br>Of the woods went glancing on starry plume;<br>He track'd the brink of the shining lake,<br>By the tall canes feather'd in tuft and brake,<br>Till the path he chose, in its mazes wound<br>To the very heart of the holy ground. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And there lay the water, as if enshrin'd<br>In a rocky urn, from the sun and wind,<br>Bearing the hues of the grove on high,<br>Far down thro' its dark still purity.<br>The flood beyond, to the fiery west<br>Spread out like a metal-mirror's breast,<br>But that lone bay, in its dimness deep,<br>Seem'd made for the swimmer's joyous leap, <br>For the stag athirst from the noontide chase,<br>For all free things of the wild-wood's race. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Like a falcon's glance on the wide blue sky,<br>Was the kindling flash of the boy's glad eye,<br>Like a sea-bird's flight to the foaming wave<br>From the shadowy bank was the bound he gave;<br>Dashing the spray-drops, cold and white,<br>O'er the glossy leaves in his young delight,<br>And bowing his locks to the waters clear–<br>Alas! he dreamt not that fate was near. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">His mother look'd from her tent the while,<br>O'er heaven and earth with a quiet smile:<br>She, on her way unto Mecca's fane,<br>Had staid the march of her pilgrim train,<br>Calmly to linger a few brief hours<br>In the Bramin city's glorious bowers;<br>For the pomp of the forest, the wave's bright fall,<br>The red gold of sunset–she lov'd them all. </div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>II</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The moon rose clear in the splendour given<br>To the deep-blue night of an Indian heaven;<br>The boy from the high-arch'd woods came back–<br>Oh! what had he met in his lonely track?<br>The serpent's glance, through the long reeds bright?<br>The arrowy spring of the tiger's might?<br>No!–yet as one by a conflict worn,<br>With his graceful hair all soil'd and torn,<br>And a gloom on the lids of his darken'd eye,<br>And a gash on his bosom–he came to die!<br>He look'd for the face to his young heart sweet,<br>And found it, and sank at his mother's feet. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Speak to me!–whence doth the swift blood run?<br>What hath befall'n thee, my child, my son?'<br>The mist of death on his brow lay pale,<br>But his voice just linger'd to breathe the tale,<br>Murmuring faintly of wrongs and scorn,<br>And wounds from the children of Brahma born: <br>This was the doom for a Moslem found<br>With a foot profane on their holy ground;<br>This was for sullying the pure waves, free<br>Unto them alone–'twas their God's decree. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">A change came o'er his wandering look–<br>The mother shriek'd not then, nor shook:<br>Breathless she knelt in her son's young blood,<br>Rending her mantle to staunch its flood;<br>But it rush'd like a river which none may stay,<br>Bearing a flower to the deep away.<br>That which our love to the earth would chain,<br>Fearfully striving with Heaven in vain,<br>That which fades from us, while yet we hold,<br>Clasp'd to our bosoms, its mortal mould,<br>Was fleeting before her, afar and fast;<br>One moment–the soul from the face had pass'd! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Are there no words for that common wo?<br>–Ask of the thousands, its depths that know! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">The boy had breathed, in his dreaming rest,<br>Like a low-voiced dove, on her gentle breast;<br>He had stood, when she sorrow'd, beside her knee,<br>Painfully stilling his quick heart's glee;<br>He had kiss'd from her cheek the widow's tears,<br>With the loving lip of his infant years;<br>He had smiled o'er her path like a bright spring-day–<br>Now in his blood on the earth he lay,<br>Murder'd!–Alas! and we love so well<br>In a world where anguish like this can dwell! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">She bow'd down mutely o'er her dead–<br>They that stood round her watch'd in dread;<br>They watch'd–she knew not they were by–<br>Her soul sat veil'd in its agony.<br>On the silent lip she press'd no kiss,<br>Too stern was the grasp of her pangs for this:<br>She shed no tear as her face bent low,<br>O'er the shining hair of the lifeless brow; </div><div style="margin:10px 0">She look'd but into the half-shut eye,<br>With a gaze that found there no reply,<br>And shrieking, mantled her head from sight,<br>And fell, struck down by her sorrow's might! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And what deep change, what work of power,<br>Was wrought on her secret soul that hour?<br>How rose the lonely one?–She rose<br>Like a prophetess from dark repose!<br>And proudly flung from her face the veil,<br>And shook the hair from her forehead pale,<br>And 'midst her wondering handmaids stood,<br>With the sudden glance of a dauntless mood.<br>Ay, lifting up to the midnight sky<br>A brow in its regal passion high,<br>With a close and rigid grasp she press'd<br>The blood-stain'd robe to her heaving breast,<br>And said–'Not yet–not yet I weep,<br>Not yet my spirit shall sink or sleep, <br>Not till yon city, in ruins rent,<br>Be piled for its victim's monument.<br>–Cover his dust! bear it on before!<br>It shall visit those temple-gates once more.' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And away in the train of the dead she turn'd,<br>The strength of her step was the heart that burn'd;<br>And the Bramin groves in the starlight smil'd,<br>As the mother pass'd with her slaughter'd child. </div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>III</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Hark! a wild sound of the desert's horn<br>Thro' the woods round the Indian city borne,<br>A peal of the cymbal and tambour afar–<br>War! 'tis the gathering of Moslem war!<br>The Bramin look'd from the leaguer'd towers–<br>He saw the wild archer amidst his bowers;<br>And the lake that flash'd through the plantain shade,<br>As the light of the lances along it play'd; <br>And the canes that shook as if winds were high,<br>When the fiery steed of the waste swept by;<br>And the camp as it lay like a billowy sea,<br>Wide round the sheltering Banian tree. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">There stood one tent from the rest apart–<br>That was the place of a wounded heart.<br>–Oh! deep is a wounded heart, and strong<br>A voice that cries against mighty wrong;<br>And full of death as a hot wind's blight,<br>Doth the ire of a crush'd affection light! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Maimuna from realm to realm had pass'd,<br>And her tale had rung like a trumpet's blast;<br>There had been words from her pale lips pour'd,<br>Each one a spell to unsheath the sword.<br>The Tartar had sprung from his steed to hear,<br>And the dark chief of Araby grasp'd his spear,<br>Till a chain of long lances begirt the wall,<br>And a vow was recorded that doom'd its fall. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Back with the dust of her son she came,<br>When her voice had kindled that lightning flame;<br>She came in the might of a queenly foe,<br>Banner, and javelin, and bended bow;<br>But a deeper power on her forehead sate–<br>There sought the warrior his star of fate;<br>Her eye's wild flash through the tented line<br>Was hail'd as a spirit and a sign,<br>And the faintest tone from her lip was caught,<br>As a Sybil's breath of prophetic thought. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Vain, bitter glory!–the gift of grief,<br>That lights up vengeance to find relief,<br>Transient and faithless!–it cannot fill<br>So the deep void of the heart, nor still<br>The yearning left by a broken tie,<br>That haunted fever of which we die! </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Sickening she turn'd from her sad renown,<br>As a king in death might reject his crown; <br>Slowly the strength of the walls gave way–<br>She wither'd faster, from day to day.<br>All the proud sounds of that banner'd plain,<br>To stay the flight of her soul were vain;<br>Like an eagle caged, it had striven, and worn<br>The frail dust ne'er for such conflicts born,<br>Till the bars were rent, and the hour was come<br>For its fearful rushing thro' darkness home. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">The bright sun set in his pomp and pride,<br>As on that eve when the fair boy died;<br>She gazed from her couch, and a softness fell<br>O'er her weary heart with the day's farewell;<br>She spoke, and her voice, in its dying tone<br>Had an echo of feelings that long seem'd flown.<br>She murmur'd a low sweet cradle song,<br>Strange midst the din of a warrior throng,<br>A song of the time when her boy's young cheek<br>Had glow'd on her breast in its slumber meek; </div><div style="margin:10px 0">But something which breathed from that mournful strain<br>Sent a fitful gust o'er her soul again;<br>And starting as if from a dream, she cried–<br>'Give him proud burial at my side!<br>There, by yon lake, where the palm-boughs wave,<br>When the temples are fallen, make there our grave.' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">And the temples fell, tho' the spirit pass'd,<br>That stay'd not for victory's voice at last;<br>When the day was won for the martyr-dead,<br>For the broken heart, and the bright blood shed. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Through the gates of the vanquish'd the Tartar steed<br>Bore in the avenger with foaming speed;<br>Free swept the flame thro' the idol fanes,<br>And the streams flow'd red, as from warrior-veins,<br>And the sword of the Moslem, let loose to slay,<br>Like the panther leapt on its flying prey, <br>Till a city of ruin begirt the shade,<br>Where the boy and his mother at rest were laid. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">Palace and tower on that plain were left,<br>Like fallen trees by the lightning cleft;<br>The wild vine mantled the stately square,<br>The Rajah's throne was the serpent's lair,<br>And the jungle grass o'er the altar sprung–<br>This was the work of one deep heart wrung!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Felicia+Dorothea+Hemans">Felicia Dorothea Hemans</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=391612" data-title="The Indian City de Felicia Dorothea Hemans" data-description="What deep wounds ever clos'd without a scar? The heart's bleed longest, and but heal to wear That which disfigures it. Childe Harold I ROYAL in splendour went down the day On the plain where an Indian city lay, With its crown of domes o'er the ..."></div> </div> </div>

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