AMERICA A PROPHECY (Illustrated Edition). William Blake

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      William Blake

      AMERICA A PROPHECY

      (Illustrated Edition)

      Published by

      Books

      - Advanced Digital Solutions & High-Quality eBook Formatting -

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      2017 OK Publishing

      ISBN 978-80-272-3161-4

      Table of Contents

       Preludium

       A Prophecy

      

      

      Preludium

       Table of Contents

      The shadowy daughter of Urthona stood before red Orc.

      When fourteen suns had faintly journey’d o’er his dark abode;

      His food she brought in iron baskets, his drink in cups of iron;

      Crown’d with a helmet & dark hair the nameless female stood;

      A quiver with its burning stores, a bow like that of night,

      When pestilence is shot from heaven; no other arms she need:

      Invulnerable tho’ naked, save where clouds roll round her loins,

      Their awful folds in the dark air; silent she stood as night;

      For never from her iron tongue could voice or sound arise;

      But dumb till that dread day when Orc assay’d his fierce embrace.

      Dark virgin; said the hairy youth, thy father stern abhorr’d;

      Rivets my tenfold chains while still on high my spirit soars;

      Sometimes an eagle screaming in the sky, sometimes a lion,

      Stalking upon the mountains, & sometimes a whale I lash

      The raging fathomless abyss, anon a serpent folding

      Around the pillars of Urthona, and round thy dark limbs,

      On the Canadian wilds I fold, feeble my spirit folds.

      For chaind beneath I rend these caverns; when thou bringest food

      I howl my joy! and my red eyes seek to behold thy face

      In vain! these clouds roll to & fro, & hide thee from my sight.

      Silent as despairing love, and strong as jealousy,

      The hairy shoulders rend the links, free are the wrists of fire;

      Round the terrific loins he siez’d the panting struggling womb;

      It joy’d: she put aside her clouds & smiled her firstborn smile;

      As when a black cloud shews its light’nings to the silent deep.

      Soon as she saw the terrible boy then burst the virgin cry.

      I know thee, I have found thee, & I will not let thee go;

      Thou art the image of God who dwells in darkness of Africa;

      And thou art fall’n to give me life in regions of dark death.

      On my American plains I feel the struggling afflictions

      Endur’d by roots that writhe their arms into the nether deep:

      I see a serpent in Canada, who courts me to his love;

      In Mexico an Eagle, and a Lion in Peru;

      I see a Whale in the South-sea, drinking my soul away.

      O what limb rending pains I feel. thy fire & my frost

      Mingle in howling pains, in furrows by thy lightnings rent;

      This is eternal death; and this the torment long foretold.

      The stern Bard ceas’d, asham’d of his own song; enrag’d he swung

      His harp aloft sounding, then dash’d its shining frame against

      A ruin’d pillar in glittring fragments; silent he turn’d away,

      And wander’d down the vales of Kent in sick & drear lamentings.