The moribund City

To Edmond Pilon

This is the City ill and weary as any mother,

Sleeping a heavy sleep on the banks of a river fatal.

So many sons, before, helmeted like the Chimera,

Have gone away, fists clenched around their fleeting banner,

That it’s afraid, this evening, to remember that way at all.

And so it sleeps, to the monotonous drone of its bells,

Close to the bridge of stone whence no man will go

Again. And all its streets that lead, by woods and fells,

With iron crosses at the terms, to nearby dells,

Are deserted, for soon Affright that way must know.

Its little houses all squat there upon the road,

Slanting gables, windows closed like eyes unmeet,

So as to hold back in sudden dark a load

Of lightfilled tears. And life has gone from this abode

With the sound of old men’s and old women’s feet.

They all have slowly climbed the hillock’s soft incline

To make their way to church where the Virgin, heavy with gold,

Grants no further wishes to her throng who decline

The song and speech of the prayer in Latin superfine

Whose meaning is closed unto them like a treasure of old.

Sometimes the organ wakes in a sob that withal jumps

All of time’s regret; and far as the river fatal

And beyond the bridge of stone and the breakwater pumps

Thunders its voice beweeping the crusaders’ pomps

Of yore, when Faith made every man both strong and vital.

And the rotten boats held tightly by their moorings

Beside the mossy quay, seem anon to rage

In a desire of flight to the lands of the Barbarians,

Yonder on the darkling sea without more beacons,

Far from the City, at last, that only knows how to age.

Stuart Merrill