Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1870-11-30
Song of Fire

'niLtttl4c pE&sOnGd AT the center,
With my throes l shake the sphere;
Through the snowy-topped volcanoes
At the surface appear;
Then burst through chains that bind me
startle mortals with my pswer,
over prairies wide | scurry,
Feed on forests, towns devour-
strike the ships midway in ocean,
And the teeming towns devour.
FIRE they call me. am father
or the granite rocks that lie
Ages deep beneath the mountains,
Unperceiyed Of mortal eye;
At my breath they sprang TO being,
AT my touch their crystals came,
That were merely shapeless atoms
Ere | kissed them with my flame
Ere with ardor l embraced them,
Ere kissed them with my flame.
Earest gems of countless value,
Nuggets Of the yellow gold
That, through all the time historic,
Men and empires have controlled.
And the grim and swarthy iron,
CoHqueror on land and sea,
With the many meaner metals,
owe their birth and shape to me
Glsl=4..f. ores ami dazzling crystals
owe tiets birth and shape TO me.
When tbs rolling OF the thunder
strikes the trembling wretches dumb,
When tia visioa-blInding lightning
Rends the murky clouds, I come.
Pear attends me, horror after,
Ruin round me wide / cast;
Men my name with baJed breathing
Mutter when my steps have passed
Gazing pairelcss on the ashes
Where my terrible steps have passed.
Rear they palaces Of beauty,
FAIR without and rare within,
Stores OF hand work filed with fabrics,
Wealth and profits hard TO win,
! Temples grand, with costly affairs,
Where tae wretch Tor sin atone s.---..s.--
Molten metal, crumbled columns,
Timbers charred, and blackened stones.
Not alone on land / smite them.
Bat with red, devourinE lips
On the ocean safe my hunger
With their richly freighted ships;
Swarthy sailors Pallid women,
Pray in vain for mercy there,
While my cracking and my roaring
swell their chorus of despair
While dance from deck to masthead
To their chorus of despair.
In the denselv crowded city,
Without pity alright
Startled wretches reused from slumber
In the stiu and sombre night.
Tcnement-house or brown->tone palace,
Either is the same 10 me;
II they manage to snbdue me,
Gloomy will their triumph be
Toppled walls upon my foemen
Tokens OF NY vengeance be.
Yet malign am not always
Witness for me truly when
become the humble servant
OF the toilingsons of men;
Drive the engine, heat the furnace,
Melt the ore, and soften steel
Like the monarch in the story,
Aid the wife TO cook a meal
Monarch, wandering from earth's center,
Aid the wife 10 cook a meal.
Though they see me when the lightning
strikes in wrath the loDy domes,
Yet love to cheer the jewellers
In the humble cottage homes
From the hearth my Pickering shadows
On the wall l cast at night,
While crackle-thats my laughter
Al the chIldren's wild delight
A. to see those tossing shadows
They display their wild delight.
Foo Of iie have mortais called me
Foe to all that brcathes or stirs;
Hence the terror-strieken pasans
Are mysabjeet worshipers.
Life there were no life without me;
And what time l shall expire:
All things growing, all things living,
All shall pass away with fire
Air, heat, motion, breath, existence
All shall pass away with fire.
In the solemn day Of Judgment,
At the awful time of doom,
r<Msv hen all quick and dead are parted,
These TO light, and those to gloom,
Then the earth that one time bore me,
Wrapped within my wild embrace,
shall behold my final splendOr
As bear her out of space
And we twain shall pass together,
Pass forever out of space.
THOMAS DUNN ENGLISH, in HarPer's Maya
for December.