The Bengali Book of English Verse/Sonnets—War (Omesh Chunder Dutt)
Sonnets—War.
I
How terrible art thou O iron War!
With vengeful furies in thy long-drawn train,
Thy step is found e'en o'er the trackless main,
Nor rock, nor sea thy fiery course can bar.
Where'er thou goest in thy rattling car,
Deserted hamlet and ensanguin'd plain,
Attest thy cruel and tyrannic reign,
And flaming towns gleam lurid from afar.
Thy blood-red standard to the winds display'd,
Thy drum's deep roll, thy trumpets shrill and clear,
The thunder of the furious cannonade,
Are sights and sounds which fill the heart with fear;
For they presage, alas! too well we know.
Rapine and wreck, untimely death and woe.
II.
But yesterday upon this ravaged spot,
Rose the proud city lifting high in air
Its graceful arches and its columns fair,
Here was the mart with life and tumult fraught;
O cruel War, what ruin hast thou wrought!
Outrage and wrong are rampant everywhere:
Hark to those shrieks, wild cry, and hopeless prayer,
Bursting alike from hall and lowly cot!
Is this the glory, this the deathless fame,
Which thou dost promise to thy lawless crew!
Shall we for this emblazon forth thy name,
Shall we for this thy path with flowerets strew!
Away,—tho' proud thy brow, and dark its frown,
It is not worthy of the victor's crown.