Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, CITIES, by MARY BRENT WHITESIDE


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

CITIES, by                    
First Line: Jerusalem is like a tower in the east
Last Line: Accursed of all the ages -- kerioth.
Subject(s): Cities; Urban Life


Jerusalem is like a tower in the East;
The name lifts upward like a soaring cry;
It is a banner flung against a darkened sky;
A broken feast.
Dead Babylon is porphyry and old wine;
Spent lust made gorgeous like a poisoned rose;
A princess of the royal blood, who goes
To lay her offerings on a tainted shrine.

Biskra is like a silver moth, and Capri tells
Of sapphire sky and water, and pink shells.
Palermo is a sculptured dream, and Thebes a cry
To heedless centuries hurrying by:
"You will not stay, as we stayed, to grow old;
This awful head was Pharaoh -- behold!"

Tyre goes wrapped in purple like a king.
Old thoughts in lavender exhale a breath,
Through long and beautiful remembering,
That spell the name of Nazareth.
Some towns are fountains; some are wells;
Seville is music; Delhi smells
Of musty fabrics sewn with gold,
And very old.
And there are ruined cities, half forgot,
That fell before the Vandal and the Goth,
And one there was that bred Iscariot --
Accursed of all the ages -- Kerioth.





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