WE sat us down and wept, <br />Where Babel's waters slept, <br />And we thought of home and Zion as a long-gone, happy dream; <br />We hung our harps in air <br />On the willow boughs, which there, <br />Gloomy as round a sepulchre, were drooping o'er the stream. <br /> <br />The foes, whose chain we wore, <br />Were with us on that shore, <br />Exulting in our tears that told the bitterness of woe. <br />'Sing us,' they cried aloud, <br />'Ye, once so high and proud, <br />'The songs ye sang in Zion ere we laid her glory low.' <br /> <br />And shall the harp of heaven <br />To Judah's monarch given <br />Be touched by captive fingers, or grace a fettered hand? <br />No! sooner be my tongue <br />Mute, powerless, and unstrung, <br />Than its words of holy music make glad a stranger land. <br /> <br />May this right hand, whose skill <br />Can wake the harp at will, <br />And bid the listeners, joys or griefs in light or darkness come, <br />Forget its godlike power, <br />If for one brief, dark hour, <br />My heart forgets Jerusalem, fallen city of my home! <br /> <br />Daughter of Babylon! <br />Blest be that chosen one, <br />Whom God shall send to smite thee when there is none to save; <br />He from the mother's breast, <br />Shall pluck the babe at rest, <br />And lay it in the sleep of death beside its father's grave.<br /><br />Fitz-Greene Halleck<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/psalm-cxxxviii/
