To Horror

Τιν γαρ ποταεισομαιταν και σκυλικες τρομεοντιΕρχομεναν νεκυων ανα τ' ηρια, και μελαν αιμα.ΘΕΟΚΡΙΤΟΣ.

Dark Horror, hear my call!Stern Genius hear from thy retreatOn some old sepulchre's moss-canker'd seat,Beneath the Abbey's ivied wallThat trembles o'er its shade;Where wrapt in midnight gloom, alone,Thou lovest to lie and hearThe roar of waters near,And listen to the deep dull groanOf some perturbed spriteBorne fitful on the heavy gales of night.

Or whether o'er some wide waste hillThou mark'st the traveller stray,Bewilder'd on his lonely way.When, loud and keen and chill,The evening winds of winter blow,Drifting deep the dismal snow.

Or if thou followest now on Groenland's shore,With all thy terrors, on the lonely wayOf some wreck'd mariner, when to the roarOf herded bears, the floating ice-hills roundPour their deep echoing sound,And by the dim drear Boreal lightGivest half his dangers to the wretch's sight.

Or if thy fury form,When o'er the midnight deepThe dark-wing'd tempests sweepWatches from some high cliff the encreasing storm,Listening with strange delight,As the black billows to the thunder raveWhen by the lightning's lightThou seest the tall ship sink beneath the wave.

Dark Horror! bear me where the field of fightScatters contagion on the tainted gale,When to the Moon's faint beam,On many a carcase shine the dews of night,And a dead silence stills the valeSave when at times is heard the glutted Raven's scream.

Where some wreck'd army from the Conqueror's mightSpeed their disastrous flight,With thee fierce Genius! let me trace their way,And hear at times the deep heart-groanOf some poor sufferer left to die alone,His sore wounds smarting with the winds of night;And we will pause, where, on the wild,The Mother to her frozen breast,On the heap'd snows reclining clasps her childAnd with him sleeps, chill'd to eternal rest!

Black Horror! speed we to the bed of Death,Where he whose murderous power afarBlasts with the myriad plagues of war,Struggles with his last breath,Then to his wildly-starting eyesThe phantoms of the murder'd rise;Then on his frenzied earTheir groans for vengeance and the Demon's yellIn one heart-maddening chorus swell.Cold on his brow convulsing stands the dew,And night eternal darkens on his view.

Horror! I call thee yet once more!Bear me to that accursed shoreWhere round the stake the impaled Negro writhes.Assume thy sacred terrors then! dispenseThe blasting gales of Pestilence!Arouse the race of Afric! holy Power,Lead them to vengeance! and in that dread hourWhen Ruin rages wide,I will behold and smile by Mercy's side.1791.