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Home  »  A Library of American Literature  »  The Watch-Fire

Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889

The Watch-Fire

By Titus Munson Coan (1836–1921)

MY soul goes wandering in the wilderness

All the day long; nor through the hours of light

Can any foe my constant footing fright,

Although I fare alone and weaponless:

But when deep shadows fall, and lay their stress

Upon me, and giant creatures glare in sight,

The panther Terror, leaping from the night,

The fiery-eyed soft-pacing lioness,—

How guard the pilgrim then, and compass him,

And beat Abaddon from him, in the hour

When age o’ertakes him in the desert dim?

The flame of Poesy shall fling a shower

Of guarding radiance—and the monsters grim

Shall flee the spot protected by its power!

The Century Magazine. 1888.