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| IN Babylon they sat and wept | |
| Down by the river’s willowy side, | |
| And when the breeze their harp-strings swept, | |
| The strings of breaking hearts replied: | |
| A deeper sorrow now they hide; | 5 |
| No Cyrus comes to set them free | |
| From ages of captivity. | |
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| All lands are Babylons to them, | |
| Exiles and fugitives they roam: | |
| What is their own Jerusalem? | 10 |
| The place where they are least at home! | |
| Yet hither from all climes they come, | |
| And pay their gold for leave to shed | |
| Tears o’er the generations fled. | |
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| Around, the eternal mountains stand, | 15 |
| With Hinnom’s darkling vale between; | |
| Old Jordan wanders through the land, | |
| Blue Carmel’s seaward crest is seen; | |
| And Lebanon, yet sternly green, | |
| Throws, when the evening sun declines, | 20 |
| Its cedar shades in lengthening lines. | |
| |
| But, ah! forever vanished hence | |
| The Temple of the living God, | |
| Once Zion’s glory and defence— | |
| Now mourn beneath the oppressor’s rod | 25 |
| The fields where faithful Abraham trod; | |
| Where Isaac walked by twilight gleam, | |
| And heaven came down on Jacob’s dream. | |
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| Forever mingled with this soil | |
| Those armies of the Lord of Hosts, | 30 |
| That conquer’d Canaan, shared the spoil, | |
| Quelled Moab’s pride, stormed Midian’s posts, | |
| Spread paleness through Philistia’s coasts, | |
| And taught the foes, whose idols fell, | |
| “There is a God in Israel.” | 35 |
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| Now David’s tabernacle gone, | |
| What mighty builder shall restore? | |
| The golden throne of Solomon, | |
| And ivory palace, are no more: | |
| The Psalmist’s song, the Preacher’s lore, | 40 |
| Of all they did, alone remain | |
| Unperished trophies of their reign. | |
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| Holy and beautiful, of old | |
| Was Zion ’midst her princely bowers; | |
| Besiegers trembled to behold | 45 |
| Bulwarks that set at nought their powers; | |
| Swept from the earth are all her towers; | |
| Nor is there—so is she bereft— | |
| One stone upon another left. | |
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| The very site whereon she stood, | 50 |
| In vain the foot, the eye would trace; | |
| Vengeance, for saints’ and martyrs’ blood, | |
| Her wails did utterly efface; | |
| Dungeons and dens usurp their place; | |
| The Cross and Crescent shine afar, | 55 |
| But where is Jacob’s natal star? | |
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| Still inexterminable—still | |
| Devoted to their mother-land, | |
| Her offspring haunt the temple hill, | |
| Amidst her desecration stand, | 60 |
| And bite the lip, and clench the hand; | |
| Today in that lorn vale they weep, | |
| Where patriarchs, kings, and prophets sleep. | |
* * * * * And by the Gentiles in their pride | |
| Jerusalem is trodden down; | 65 |
| “How long? forever wilt thou hide | |
| Thy face, O Lord! forever frown? | |
| Israel was once thy glorious crown, | |
| In sight of all the heathen worn; | |
| Now from thy brow indignant torn. | 70 |
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| “Zion, forsaken and forgot, | |
| Hath felt thy stroke, and owns it just; | |
| O God, our God! reject her not, | |
| Whose sons take pleasure in her dust; | |
| How is the fine gold dimmed with rust! | 75 |
| The city, throned in gorgeous state, | |
| How doth she now sit desolate!” | |
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