Mathilde Blind (1841–1896)

HAIL, God revived in glory!

The night is over and done;

Far mountains wrinkled and hoary,

Fair cities great in story,

Flash in the rising sun.

The young-eyed Day uncloses

Curtains of filmy lawn,

And blossoming like roses

The Wilderness reposes

Beneath the Rose of Dawn.

Hail, golden House of Horus,

Lap of heav’n’s holiest God!

From lotus-banks before us

Birds in ecstatic chorus

Fly, singing, from the sod.

Up, up, into the shining

Translucent morning sky,

No longer dull and pining,

With drooping wings declining,

The storks and eagles fly.

The Nile amid his rushes

Reflects thy risen disk;

A light of gladness gushes

Thro’ kindling halls, and flushes

Each flaming Obelisk.

Vast temples catch thy splendour;

Vistas of columns shine

Celestial, with a tender

Rose-bloom on every slender

Papyrus-pillar’d shrine.

In manifold disguises

And under many names,

Thrice-holy son of Isis,

We worship him who rises

A Child-god fledged in flames.

Hail, sacred Hawk, who winging

Crossest the heavenly sea!

With harp-playing, with singing,

With linen robes white-clinging,

We come, fair God, to thee.

Thou, whom our soul espouses,

When weary of the way,

Enter our golden houses,

And with thy mystic spouses

Rest from the long, long way!