American Poetry, 1922

Author:Frost, Robert [Frost, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Poetry
Publisher: manybooks.net

* * *

Divided now are winds and waters. Sea and land,

Tohu and Bohu, light and darkness, stand

Upright on either hand.

And down this terrible aisle,

While heaven's ranges roar aghast,

Pours a vast file of strange and hidden things:

Forbidden monsters, crocodiles with wings

And perfumed flesh that sings and glows

With more fresh colors than the rainbow knows....

The _reëm_, those great beasts with eighteen horns,

Who mate but once in seventy years and die

In their own tears which flow ten stadia high.

The _shamir_, made by God on the sixth morn,

No longer than a grain of barley corn

But stronger than the bull of Bashan and so hard

It cuts through diamonds. Meshed and starred

With precious stones, there struts the shattering _ziz_

Whose groans are wrinkled thunder....

For thrice three hundred years the full parade

Files past, a cavalcade of fear and wonder.

And then the vast aisle clears.

Now comes our constantly increased reward.

The Lord commands that monstrous beast,

Leviathan, to be our feast.

What cheers ascend from horde on ravenous horde!

One hears the towering creature rend the seas,

Frustrated, cowering, and his pleas ignored.

In vain his great, belated tears are poured--

For this he was created, kept and nursed.

Cries burst from all the millions that attend:

_"Ascend, Leviathan, it is the end!

We hunger and we thirst! Ascend!" ..._

Observe him first, my friend.

_God's deathless plaything rolls an eye

Five hundred thousand cubits high.

The smallest scale upon his tail

Could hide six dolphins and a whale.

His nostrils breathe--and on the spot

The churning waves turn seething hot.

If he be hungry, one huge fin

Drives seven thousand fishes in;

And when he drinks what he may need,

The rivers of the earth recede.

Yet he is more than huge and strong--

Twelve brilliant colors play along

His sides until, compared to him,

The naked, burning sun seems dim.

New scintillating rays extend

Through endless singing space and rise

Into an ecstasy that cries:

"Ascend, Leviathan, ascend!"_

God now commands the multi-colored bands

Of angels to intrude and slay the beast

That His good sons may have a feast of food.

But as they come, Leviathan sneezes twice ...

And, numb with sudden pangs, each arm hangs slack.

Black terror seizes them; blood freezes into ice

And every angel flees from the attack!

God, with a look that spells eternal law,

Compels them back.

But, though they fight and smite him tail and jaw,

Nothing avails; upon his scales their swords

Break like frayed cords or, like a blade of straw,

Bend towards the hilt and wilt like faded grass.

Defeat and fresh retreat.... But once again

God's murmurs pass among them and they mass

With firmer steps upon the crowded plain.

Vast clouds of spears and stones rise from the ground;

But every dart flies past and rocks rebound

To the disheartened angels falling around.

A pause.

The angel host withdraws

With empty boasts throughout its sullen files.

Suddenly God smiles....

On the walls of heaven a tumble of light is caught.

Low thunder rumbles like an afterthought;

And God's slow laughter calls:

"Behemot!"

_Behemot, sweating blood,

Uses for his daily food

All the fodder, flesh and juice

That twelve tall mountains can produce._

_Jordan, flooded to the brim,

Is a single gulp to him;

Two great streams from Paradise

Cool his lips and scarce suffice._

_When he shifts from side to side

Earthquakes gape and open wide;_

_When a nightmare makes him snore,

All the dead volcanoes roar.

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