Westward a league the city lay, with one <br />Cloud's imminent umbrage o'er it: when behold, <br />The incendiary sun <br />Dropped from the womb o' the vapour, rolled <br />'Mongst huddled towers and temples, 'twixt them set <br />Infinite ardour of candescent gold, <br />Encompassed minaret <br />And terrace and marmoreal spire <br />With conflagration: roofs enfurnaced, yet <br />Unmolten,-columns and cupolas flanked with fire, <br />Yet standing unconsumed <br />Of the fierce fervency,-and higher <br />Than all, their fringes goldenly illumed, <br />Dishevelled clouds, like massed empurpled smoke <br />From smouldering forges fumed: <br />Till suddenly the bright spell broke <br />With the sun sinking through some palace-floor <br />And vanishing wholly. Then the city woke, <br />Her mighty Fire-Dream o'er, <br />As who from out a sleep is raised <br />Of terrible loveliness, lasting hardly more <br />Than one most monumental moment; dazed <br />He looketh, having come <br />Forth of one world and witless gazed <br />Into another: ev'n so looked, for some <br />Brief while, the city-amazed, immobile, dumb.<br /><br />William Watson<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-sunset-8/
