The Awakening Poem by Robert Atkinson

EACH hour that passes, dead for evermore,
Lies in the waste of ages whence the stale
Air of unwoken silence, shore to shore.
Reeks unto death, and where far plains grow pale,
Fumes in a light mirage whose azure floor

Floats dream-born, burnished citadel and sail! . .

And I can hear the very silence wail

With cries flung back from crag to desert-vale.

Day in and out we, lured by tardy hopes,
Drawn on to slumber, lag so drearily

That almost God would light the poppied slopes,
Clogged with the living bogged in agony.

And still we struggle. Vainly each man gropes
Death at his feet, and woman at his knee
With naked smiles and hidden mockery.
Scarce dreaming she is damned as well as he.

Dark death swoons on before us, and behind
The void, alone — yet this awoke and wed

Life unto life with love, and hopes that twin'd
Sweet blossoming joys about us, limb and head! . .

I can hear the shrieking voices of the wind
Shudder across the waste, dispirited:
Surely death's silence shall awake the dead :
Shall woe not rule when joy and love have fled?