Page:Roden Noel - A Little Child's Monument - 1881.pdf/85

Journeying by the very place
Where I beheld his little face
Pondering on the mighty beast,
More than all to me, though least,
Seeing now through tear suffusion
Without him all the loud confusion!

Once again the living creatures,
With their weary sullen features,
I behold behind the bars,
Where the den's dull limit mars
All wild splendour of their pride,
Abates the grandeur of their stride.
Bondage tames the fervid eyes,
As night doth the torrid skies,
To a lurid sultriness,
Clouded o'er with vague distress;
Emblems of our human race,
Fallen from their lofty place,
Blind, bewildered, bound within
By the manacles of sin!

With a glad and grave surprise
The terror of their gleaming eyes
He considers, mirthful mime
Of them in a little time.
Again I view the elephant,