Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Asia: Vols. XXI–XXIII. 1876–79.
The Prayer in the Desert
By Edna Dean Proctor (1829–1923)U
Behind him stretch the solemn sands
Back to the barren hills that lie
Serene against the azure sky.
Slow-winding from their dim defiles
O’er scorching waste and sedgy isles,
From lordly Cairo, Mecca-bound,
Threading the plain without a sound
Save when the burdened camels groan
Or tents are pitched by fountain-stone,
The long-drawn caravan is seen
Wrapped in the desert’s blinding sheen.
Though clear the burning sun has set;
But waste and hill and brooding sky
Have stirred his soul to deep reply,
And he, the chief of all his tribe,
Has spurred him forward to ascribe
Glory to Allah, ere the gloom
And fierceness of the dread simoom
Shall overwhelm, or failing well
No pilgrim spare, His power to tell.
Light from the north the rising breeze
Lifts the hot cloud, and moans away
Down to some Petra’s still decay,
Sad, as if wailing fall and rise
Were won from dying pilgrims’ sighs,—
Their couch by billowy sands o’erblown
Where Azrael keeps watch alone.
And now, his sandals’ weight unbound,
The desert space is holy ground;
No more he sees the weary train,
The sombre hills, the dusty plain,
But greenest fields of Paradise
Shine fair before his ravished eyes.
He hears the flow of crystal streams,
He sees the wondrous light that gleams
From Allah’s throne, ablaze with gems,
And, far below, the slender stems
Of plumy palms, whose ripe dates fall
When winds blow cool across the wall;
While sweeter than the bulbul’s note
Within the dusk pomegranate bowers,
When his full soul he fain would float
Forth to their yearning, flaming flowers,
The voice of angel Israfeel
Comes winding, warbling through the air,—
Oh that ’t were resurrection’s peal,
And he, the dead, might waken there,—
Waken and follow Edenward,
Lost in the splendor of the Lord!
While tents are pitched with jest and song;
But not the night-dews, chill and fleet,
Nor noontide’s burning, blasting heat,
Nor red simoom, nor mocking well
Can break his vision’s sacred spell,
Nor lure his joy that forward flies
To build and sing in fairer skies.
All day we rove some desert sea;
The winds are dead, the wells are dry,
Above us flames the torrid sky;
And only in some twilight calm,
When fires are spent and air is balm,
Beyond our griefs and fears we ride;
Our sandal-cares we cast aside;
The clouds of doubt are backward blown,
And lo! we meet the Lord alone!