Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/88

IN WAR TIME 2

There, through the icy mail of the boreal heaven,

Two-edged and burning swords by unseen hands

Were thrust, till a climbing throng its path had riven

Straight from the Pole, and, over seas and lands,

Pushed for the zenith, while from East to West

Flamed many a towering helm and gorgeous crest;

And then, a rarer pageant than the rest,

An angrier light glared from the southern sky,

As if the austral trumpets made reply,

And the wrath of a challenged realm had swiftly tost

On the empyrean the flags of another host,—

Pennons with or and scarlet blazing high,

Crimson and orange banners proudly crost;

While through the environed space, that lay between

Their adverse fronts, the ether seemed to tremble,

Shuddering to view such ruthless foes assemble,

And one by one the stars withdrew their sheen.

3

The two, enrapt with such a vision, saw

Its ominous surges, dense, prismatic, vast,

Heaved from the round horizon; and in awe,

Musing awhile, were silent. Till at last

The younger, fair in widow's garments, spoke:

The deep, innumerous columns roll;

As if the angelic tribes their concord broke,

And the fierce war that scathes our land had spread

Above, and the very skies with ire were red!"

4

Even as she spoke, there shone

High in the topmost zenith a central spark,

A luminous cloud that glowed against the dark;

Its halo, widening toward either zone,

Took on the semblance of a mystic hand 58