Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By EdwinMarkham

1083 A Look into the Gulf

I LOOKED one night, and there Semiramis,

With all her mourning doves about her head,

Sat rocking on an ancient road of Hell,

Withered and eyeless, chanting to the moon

Snatches of song they sang to her of old

Upon the lighted roofs of Nineveh.

And then her voice rang out with rattling laugh:

“The bugles! they are crying back again—

Bugles that broke the nights of Babylon,

And then went crying on through Nineveh.

Stand back, ye trembling messengers of ill!

Women, let go my hair: I am the Queen,

A whirlwind and a blaze of swords to quell

Insurgent cities. Let the iron tread

Of armies shake the earth. Look, lofty towers:

Assyria goes by upon the wind!”

And so she babbles by the ancient road,

While cities turned to dust upon the Earth

Rise through her whirling brain to live again—

Babbles all night, and when her voice is dead

Her weary lips beat on without a sound