VASSOS
SILENT he sits upon the Cretan height,
A girdling ring of fleets and forts below;
He sees the war-ships gliding to and fro,
Hears distant, summoning trumpets through the night.
Far off is Greece, the enemy is near;
To her he speaks, to him he nothing says;
Borrowing the lightning’s language for his phrase,
With fiery flash he talks, in utterance clear.
In the old time a monarch through the murk
Stared shuddering, and watched while fiery lines
Traced on the wall a word of destiny;
And so the “Christian” kings who serve the Turk
May read like message in those flashing signs:
“Weighed, wanting, lo! thy power is taken from thee.”