Page:Poems Sigourney 1827.pdf/188

       Louder swells the battle-cry;
       God of Christians! from the sky
       Behold the Turk's accursed host
       Come rushing in.—'T is lost!—'T is lost!—
                  Ye bold defenders, die!—
O thou, who sang'st of Ilion's walls the fate,
Unseal thy blinded orbs, thine own are desolate.

           The stifled sob of mighty souls
              Rises on the glowing air,
           And the vow of vengeance rolls,
              Mingled with the dying prayer,
    "Now, by the spirits of the brave,
    Sires, who rode on glory's wave,
    By red Scio's wrongs and groans,
    By Ipsara's unburied bones.
    Our foes beneath these reeking stones.
               Shall find a grave." —

    Earth heaves, as if she gorged again
    Usurping Korah's rebel train.
    She heaves, with blast more wild and loud,
    Than when with trump of thunders proud,
    The electric flame subdues the cloud,
Torn and dismember'd frames are thrown on high,
And then the oppressor and opprest in equal silence lie.

    Come jewell'd Sultan, from thine hall of state!
           Exult o'er Missolonghi's fall,
       With flashing eye, and step elate
    The blood-pools count around her ruin'd wall.—
       Seek'st thou thus with glances vain
       The remnant of thy Moslem train?—