Poem by Ebenezer Elliott

The Tree of Rivilin

THE LIGHTNING, like an Arab, crossed
  The moon’s dark path on high,
And wild on Rivilin writhed and tossed
  The stars and troubled sky,
Where lone the tree of ages grew,
  With branches wide and tall:
Ah! who, when such a tempest blew,
  Could hear his stormy fall?
But now the skies, the stars are still,
  The blue wave sleeps again,
And heath and moss, by rock and rill,
  Are whispering, in disdain,
That Rivilin’s side is desolate,
  Her giant in the dust!
Beware, O Power! for God is great,
  O Guilt! for God is just!
And boast not, Pride! while millions pine,
  That wealth secures thy home:
The storm that shakes all hearths but thine
  Is not the storm to come.
The tremor of the stars is pale,
  The dead clod quakes with fear,
The worm slinks down o’er hill and vale,
  When God in wrath draws near.
But if the Upas will not bend
  Beneath the frown of Heaven,
A whisper cometh, which shall rend
  What thunder hath not riven.

1. Don and Rother
2. Win-Hill
3. Plaint
4. Ribbledin; or, The Christening
5. Roch Abbey

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