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Show RESURGAM. (Chant Royal.) By Louis Alexander Robertson. The cataclyosmal force to which wo owe Our glorious Gate of Gold, through which the sea Rushed in. to clasp these shores long, long ago, Came once again to crown our destiny Which such a grandeur that in sequent years This period of pain which now appears Pregnant with doubt, shall vanish as when day Drives the foreboding dreams of night away; Born of the womb of Woe, where Sorrow sighs, Fostered by Faith, unda ted by Dismay, Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise. Portentous of her lasting overthrow, Scarce forty fateful seconds seems to be; And when the stars had faded in the glow Of the fierce baleful after-blaze, though she Shed for some harrowing hours the tristful tears Which showed her heart was torn, the Soul that cheers, And drives Despair forth from the creature clay Glowed In her breast and did to her display Great stately structures soaring to the skies; If from our cosmic creed we do not stray, Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise. Garbed with chaste Grecian beauty she shall grow Her white hand hold's Fortuna's fate-forged key To where a world's ships, speeding to and fro, Shall pause and pay a rich restoring fee. Corruption, greed, and everything that bears A semblance to them, every thought that sears The heart and seeks the conscience to betray, Must dip ere born, lest later on decay; Destroy the fabric seen with Fancy's eyes; If we our crime-condemning laws obey Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise. When first her burning tears began to flow, Her sapphire surges sobbed with sympathy; The stars of heaven heard that wail of woe And chanted a responding threnody; The weeping waves, the mystic midnight spheres Dispelled her doubts and drove away her fears Of doomful dawns. Almighty God! Are they Not Baal's blind and blatant priests who say The seismic curse was Thine? Thy Voice replies VHeed not the heresy they preach and pray, Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise." Oftimes from Shasta's cloud-kissed crest of snow Soul-winged I drift o'er river, grove and lea To where I hear old Triton's trumpet blow-Where blow-Where from the tide the wave-wombed Diety Rises resplendent; with enraptured ears The Goatfoot's fluting reeds afar she hears; Oft Bacchus calls her from the sparkling spray, His vine-bound brow on her white breast to lay; Now in one hymn their voices harmonize, This message doth the melody convey, Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise. ENVOY. Thou demon Fate, that erstwhile sought to flay And scourge us to the death, thou canst not slay The faith that every future blow defies; Thought we thy stealthy steps can never stay, Earth's fairest City shall from ashes rise. Town Talk. |