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(From Joaquin Murietta)
I STAND upon a stony rim, | |
| Stone-paved and patterned as a street; | |
| A rock-lipped cañon plunging south, | |
| As if it were earth’s opened mouth, | |
| Yawns deep and darkling at my feet; | 5 |
| So deep, so distant, and so dim | |
| Its waters wind, a yellow thread, | |
| And call so faintly and so far, | |
| I turn aside my swooning head. | |
| I feel a fierce impulse to leap | 10 |
| Adown the beetling precipice, | |
| Like some lone, lost, uncertain star; | |
| To plunge into a place unknown, | |
| And win a world all, all my own; | |
| Or if I might not meet that bliss, | 15 |
| At least escape the curse of this. | |
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| I gaze again. A gleaming star | |
| Shines back as from some mossy well | |
| Reflected from blue fields afar. | |
| Brown hawks are wheeling here and there, | 20 |
| And up and down the broken wall | |
| Cling clumps of dark green chaparral, | |
| While from the rent rocks, gray and bare, | |
| Blue junipers hang in the air. | |
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| Here, cedars sweep the stream, and here, | 25 |
| Among the boulders mossed and brown | |
| That time and storms have toppled down | |
| From towers undefiled by man, | |
| Low cabins nestle as in fear, | |
| And look no taller than a span. | 30 |
| From low and shapeless chimneys rise | |
| Some tall straight columns of blue smoke, | |
| And weld them to the bluer skies; | |
| While sounding down the sombre gorge | |
| I hear the steady pickaxe stroke, | 35 |
| As if upon a flashing forge. | |
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| Another scene, another sound!— | |
| Sharp shots are fretting through the air, | |
| Red knives are flashing everywhere, | |
| And here and there the yellow flood | 40 |
| Is purpled with warm smoking blood. | |
| The brown hawk swoops low to the ground, | |
| And nimble chipmonks, small and still, | |
| Dart stripéd lines across the sill | |
| That lordly feet shall press no more. | 45 |
| The flume lies warping in the sun, | |
| The pan sits empty by the door, | |
| The pickaxe on its bed-rock floor | |
| Lies rusting in the silent mine. | |
| There comes no single sound nor sign | 50 |
| Of life, beside yon monks in brown | |
| That dart their dim shapes up and down | |
| The rocks that swelter in the sun; | |
| But dashing round yon rocky spur | |
| Where scarce a hawk would dare to whir, | 55 |
| Fly horsemen reckless in their flight. | |
| One wears a flowing black capote, | |
| While down the cape doth flow and float | |
| Long locks of hair as dark as night, | |
| And hands are red that erst were white. | 60 |
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| All up and down the land to-day | |
| Black desolation and despair | |
| It seems have sat and settled there, | |
| With none to frighten them away. | |
| Like sentries watching by the way | 65 |
| Black chimneys topple in the air, | |
| And seem to say, Go back, beware! | |
| While up around the mountain’s rim | |
| Are clouds of smoke, so still and grim | |
| They look as they are fastened there. | 70 |
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| A lonely stillness, so like death, | |
| So touches, terrifies all things, | |
| That even rooks that fly o’erhead | |
| Are hushed, and seem to hold their breath, | |
| To fly with muffled wings, | 75 |
| And heavy as if made of lead. | |
| Some skulls that crumble to the touch, | |
| Some joints of thin and chalk-like bone, | |
| A tall black chimney, all alone, | |
| That leans as if upon a crutch, | 80 |
| Alone are left to mark or tell, | |
| Instead of cross or cryptic stone, | |
| Where fair maids loved or brave men fell. | |
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