Fugitive Poetry. 1600–1878/The Deluge

The Deluge.

The judgment was at hand. Before the sun
Gathered tempestuous clouds, which, blackening, spread
Until their blended masses overwhelmed
The hemisphere of day: and, adding gloom
To night's dark empire, swift from zone to zone
Swept the vast shadow, swallowing up all light
And covering the encircling firmament
As with a mighty pall! Low in the dust
Bowed the affrighted nations, worshipping.
Anon the o'ercharged garners of the storm
Burst with their growing burden; fierce and fast
Shot down the ponderous rain, a sheeted flood
That slanted not before the baffled winds,
But, with an arrowy and unwavering rush,
Dashed hissing earthward. Soon the rivers rose,
And roaring fled their channels; and calm lakes
Awoke exulting from their lethargy,
And poured destruction on their peaceful shores.

The lightning flickered in the deluged air,
And feebly through the shout of gathering waves
Muttered the stifled thunder. Day nor night
Ceased the descending streams; and if the gloom
A little brightened, when the lurid morn
Rose on the starless midnight, 'twas to show
The lifting up of waters. Bird and beast
Forsook the flooded plains, and wearily
The shivering multitudes of human doomed
Toiled up before the insatiate element.

Oceans were blent, and the leviathan
Was borne aloft on the ascending seas
To where the eagle nestled. Mountains now
Were the sole land-marks, and their sides were clothed
With clustering myriads, from the weltering waste
Whose surges clasped them, to their topmost peaks,
Swathed in the stooping cloud. The hand of death
Smote millions as they climbed; yet denser grew
The crowded nations, as the encroaching waves
Narrowed their little world.
And in that hour
Did no man aid his fellow. Love of life
Was the sole instinct; and the strong-limbed son,
With imprecations, smote the palsied sire
That clung to him for succour. Woman trod

With wavering steps the precipice's brow,
And found no arm to grasp on the dread verge
O'er which she leaned and trembled. Selfishness
Sat like an incubus on every heart,
Smothering the voice of love. The giant's foot
Was on the stripling's neck; and oft despair
Grappled the ready steel, and kindred blood
Polluted the last remnant of that earth'
Which God was deluging to purify.
Huge monsters from the plains, whose skeletons
The mildew of succeeding centuries
Has failed to crumble, with unwieldy strength
Crushed through the solid crowds; and fiercest birds
Beat downwards by the ever-rushing rain,
With blinded eyes, drenched plumes, and trailing wings,
Staggered unconscious o'er the trampled prey.

The mountains were submerged; the barrier chains
That mapped out nations sank; until at length
One Titan peak alone o'ertopped the waves,
Beaconing a sunken world. And of the tribes
That blackened every alp, one man survived:
And he stood shuddering, helpless, shelterless,
Upon that fragment of the universe.
The surges of the universal sea
Broke on his naked feet. On his grey head,
Which fear, not time, had silvered, the black cloud
Poured its unpitying torrents; while around,
In the green twilight dimly visible,
Rolled the grim legions of the ghastly drowned,
And seemed to beckon with their tossing arms
Their brother to his doom.
He smote his brow,
And, maddened, would have leapt to their embrace;
When, lo! before him, riding on the deep,
Loomed a vast fabric, and familiar sounds
Proclaimed that it was peopled. Hope once more
Cheered the wan outcast, and imploringly
He stretched his arms forth toward the floating walls,
And cried aloud for mercy. But his prayer
Man might not answer, whom his God condemned.
The ark swept onward, and the billows rose
And buried their last victim!
Then the gloom
Broke from the face of heaven, and sunlight streamed
Upon the shoreless sea, and on the roof
That rose for shelter o'er the living germ
Whose increase should repopulate a world.