32
God of the earth! what cries
Rang upward unto Thee?
Voices of agony and blood,
From ship-deck and from sea.
The last dull plunge was heard—
The last wave caught its stain—
And the unsated sharks look'd up
For human hearts in vain.
*****
Red glowed the western waters—
The setting sun was there,
Scattering alike on wave and cloud
His fiery mesh of hair.
Amidst a group in blindness,
A solitary eye
Gazed, from the burden'd slaver's deck,
Into that burning sky.
'A storm,' spoke out the gazer,
'Is gathering and at hand—
Curse on 't—I'd give my other eye
For one firm rood of land.
And then he laugh'd—but only
His echoed laugh replied—
For the blinded and the suffering
Alone were at his side.
Night settled on the waters,
And on a stromy heaven,
While fiercely on that lone ship's track
The thunder-gust was driven.
