Page:Poems By Chauncy Hare Townshend.djvu/381
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WATERLOO.
357
Contrasted lies, with features sternly set,
Each ghastlier corse, which seems to menace yet:
The war-horse stiff; his head thrown wildly back,
And limbs extended as on torture's rack.
And here, and there, about the horrid plain,
The wounded, stumbling o'er the heaps of slain,
G'are on each other with impatient eyes,
And look the vengeance, their weak arm denies.
Or thou may'st see some sad survivor bend
O'er the cold relics of an only friend.
Oh, there are hearts, that can but blend with one,
And earth becomes a void when that is gone!
There hover too the harpies of the strife,
Whose poignard drinks the last of ebbing life.
Greedy as Death, with Death the spoil they share,
Fiercely away the warrior's arms they tear,
Cuirass, and spear, whose shine is dimm'd in blood,
Helmet, and plume, all trampled deep in mud,
Deaf to th' imploring groans, that feebly burst
From the poor victims of insatiate thirst.
All-all is horror! Spare the aching sight,
Nor close in gloom the triumphs of the fight.
Each ghastlier corse, which seems to menace yet:
The war-horse stiff; his head thrown wildly back,
And limbs extended as on torture's rack.
And here, and there, about the horrid plain,
The wounded, stumbling o'er the heaps of slain,
G'are on each other with impatient eyes,
And look the vengeance, their weak arm denies.
Or thou may'st see some sad survivor bend
O'er the cold relics of an only friend.
Oh, there are hearts, that can but blend with one,
And earth becomes a void when that is gone!
There hover too the harpies of the strife,
Whose poignard drinks the last of ebbing life.
Greedy as Death, with Death the spoil they share,
Fiercely away the warrior's arms they tear,
Cuirass, and spear, whose shine is dimm'd in blood,
Helmet, and plume, all trampled deep in mud,
Deaf to th' imploring groans, that feebly burst
From the poor victims of insatiate thirst.
All-all is horror! Spare the aching sight,
Nor close in gloom the triumphs of the fight.
Oh what a change one fleeting day has wrought,
Too wild for fancy, and too swift for thought!
Too wild for fancy, and too swift for thought!