THE SLEEPING GIANT

When did you sink to your dreamless sleep

Out there in your thunder bed?

Where the tempests sweep,

And the waters leap,

And the storms rage overhead.

Were you lying there on your couch alone

Ere Egypt and Rome were born?

Ere the Age of Stone,

Or the world had known

The Man with the Crown of Thorn.

The winds screech down from the open west,

And the thunders beat and break

On the amethyst

Of your rugged breast,—

But you never arise or wake.

You have locked your past, and you keep the key

In your heart‘ neath the westing sun,

Where the mighty sea

And its shores will be

Storm-swept till the world is done.