Page:Zinzendorff and Other Poems.pdf/27

Rh By the meek magic of his beaming smile, Drew back the forked tongue, that quivering long'd To dart the o'erflowing poison,—and with crest Erect and sparkling, glided slow away. Doubtless he is a god. We dared not raise The hand against him. For the power forsook Our limbs, and scarcely have we totter'd here To bring thee tidings. Prophet! bid no more His blood be shed. The deadly snake disarm'd, The might departing from our warrior-hearts That never blench'd in battle, or turn'd back From mortal man, bear witness, he is god." —A shriek rose sharply o'er the warring winds, “Hence,—curs'd and woman-hearted! Would this arm Might but one moment claim its ancient strength, And lay ye low. Hence! See my face no more!" —And so he drove them forth, tho' sounding rains Did roar like torrents down the rifled rocks, And lightnings cleaving wide the trembling cloud, Blacken'd the forest-pines. Time sped his wing, And on the Lehigh's solitary banks The Missionary stood. O'er that smooth tide The pensive moon wrote out in pencil'd rays, The same deep language, which his boyhood read Upon the billowy Rhine. Mild evening's breeze, Stirring the interlacing of the elms, And the slight reeds that fring'd the river's brink, Pour'd the same soul-dissolving sigh, that swept His own Lusatian forests. And the voice— The writing, were of God. Serene he mus'd,