Evening of Battle

Evening of Battle

Original Text

Sonnets of José-Maria de Heredia, trans. Edward Robeson Taylor (San Francisco: W. Doxey, 1897): 80. Internet Archive

1Severe the battle's shock. Centurions
2And tribunes, rallying their men, drink in
3Once more from air that vibrates with their din
4The scents and ardors of red slaughter's sons.
5With gloomy eyes, computing their lost ones,
6The soldiers see, like leaves of autumn's kin,
7Afar, Phraortes' archers whirl and spin;
8And sweat adown their tawny faces runs.
9And then appeared, with arrows bristling round,
10Red from the vermeil stream of many a wound,
11'Neath floating purple and the brass's glare,
12To sound of trumpets' flourish, grand of mien,
13Quelling his plunging horse, and bathed in sheen
14Of fiery sky, the Imperator there.
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
Data entry: Sharine Leung
RPO Edition
2012
Form