Tabb’s Poetry VI
Onset
Lo, where the routed shadows pass,
Upon each lifted blade of grass
The tokens of a fray—
Pale life-drops from the heart of Night,
Mute witnesses of sudden flight
Before the host of Day.
Brink-Song
A note so near the dawn
Too timid was to stay
Till shadows all were gone,
But, dreamlike, sped away
While paled the hesitating sky
For Day to bloom or Night to die.
Daybreak
Thou hast not looked on Yesterday,
Nor shalt Tomorrow see;
Upon thy solitary way
Is none to pilot thee:
Thou comest to thine own
A stranger and alone.
And yet, alas, thy countenance
To us familiar seems;
The wonder of thy wakening glance,
The vanishing of dreams,
Is like an old refrain
From silence come again.
Dawn
Behold, as from a silver horn,
The sacerdotal Night
Outpours upon his latest-born
The chrism of the light;
And bids him to the altar come,
Whereon for sacrifice,
(A lamb before his shearers, dumb,)
A victim shadow lies.
The Dayspring
What hand with spear of light
Hath cleft the side of Night,
And from the red wound wide
Fashioned the Dawn, his bride?
Was it the deed of Death?
Nay; but of Love, that saith,
“Henceforth be Shade and Sun,
In bonds of Beauty, one.”
For a recitation, click the play button:
“Onset”: Lyrics, p. 62; Poetry, p. 83. October 1892.
“Brink-Song”: Later Lyrics, p. 50; Poetry, p. 76. 1902.
“Daybreak”: Later Lyrics, p. 48; Poetry, p. 72. 1902.
“Dawn”: Lyrics, p. 2; Poetry, p. 71. October 1895. Sacerdotal means priestly; chrism is the consecrated oil used during sacramental rites such as Confirmation and Ordination; the penultimate line alludes to Isaiah 53:7 and Acts 8:32.
“The Dayspring”: Poems, p. 39; Poetry, p. 71. 1894.
