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I THE ANCIENT of cities!—the lady of nations! | |
| The home where the cherubims hovered in light! | |
| Where the breeze has a voice like those old “lamentations” | |
| That saddened thy day with their omens of night, | |
| And the river’s low song seems to echo the strain | 5 |
| Which the prophet poured out to thy spirit—in vain! | |
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II Bright land of the promise!—whose vision of glory | |
| Had dazzled thy sense, till ’t was feeble to see! | |
| O, chosen for others to keep the high story | |
| Whose record was vain for thy children and thee! | 10 |
| Lone Esau of nations, that weepest alway, | |
| While the gentile is rich in thy birthright today! | |
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III Lost land of the minstrel!—whose harp, in its sadness, | |
| Brought music from heaven, to play to thy heart,— | |
| Whose spell of a moment came down on thy madness, | 15 |
| And bade, for an hour, thy dark angel depart,— | |
| Till the power of its warning expired with its strain, | |
| And the spirit of evil came o’er thee again! | |
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IV And O, for the outcast who drank of thy glory,— | |
| The lost one of Judah,—the chosen of yore,— | 20 |
| The priest of thy temple,—the heir of thy story,— | |
| Who dwelt in thy vineyards, that blossom no more! | |
| Afar, ’mid the heathen, he sitteth forlorn,— | |
| And thy fruit is the bramble, thy greenness the thorn! | |
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V It was not for Edom that Zion was braided | 25 |
| With crowns of the sunshine and garlands of bloom, | |
| Where the wild Arab wanders the cedar hath faded, | |
| The bird of the wild keepeth watch on the tomb;— | |
| And the soil of the simoon awaits the far day, | |
| When the rain shall return to the wilderness gray. | 30 |
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VI Pale daughter of Zion!—all wasted with weeping, | |
| Thy footstool the desert,—its dust on thy head; | |
| Thy long weary watch o’er the wilderness keeping, | |
| And sitting in darkness, like them that be dead;— | |
| A veil like the widow’s hath shadowed thy pride, | 35 |
| And a sorrow is thine like no sorrow beside! | |
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VII And sadly thy son by each far-foreign river | |
| Sits, as he sat in the Babel of old,— | |
| Lone ’mid the nations,—all homeless forever, | |
| ’Mid homes full of children,—and poor ’mid his gold;— | 40 |
| With a mark on his brow of the brand in his brain, | |
| Like the record God wrote on the forehead of Cain! | |
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VIII Weary with wandering and wasted with sadness, | |
| And walking by lights that are all from the past,— | |
| Wishes, scarce hopes, waken smiles without gladness, | 45 |
| As backward his thoughts, like the mourner’s, are cast; | |
| For the tale of the Hebrew who wanders alway | |
| Is the fable and type of his people today! | |
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IX A proverb to most, and a moral to all, | |
| And a lamp unto others, though sitting in gloom,— | 50 |
| He seems like a mute in a festival hall, | |
| And is still looking forward for that which hath come;— | |
| Like the children of Eblis, he hideth his smart, | |
| And walks through the world with his hand on his heart! | |
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X All lands are as Moab—all countries are Edom, | 55 |
| To the Hebrew, who sits in his sackcloth of sin,— | |
| Till the trumpets of God calling others to freedom, | |
| The Jews to that banner at length shall come in;— | |
| And Salem must sit in her desert alone, | |
| Till the seed of the Lord by all rivers be sown. | 60 |
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XI Then, daughter of Judah! look up from thy slumber! | |
| And lo! a bright vision of turrets and spires! | |
| A hymn o’er the desert, from harps without number! | |
| Thy children at rest by the shrine of their sires! | |
| The song-bird on Carmel,—the rose in the plain,— | 65 |
| And the streams flowing backward to Zion again! | |
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