T. Thomas Fortune, “The Pyramids” (1906)
As built the toilers of the Nile,
Whose rude and ruthless tyrants willed
That God's eternal sun should smile.
On monuments of dust and stone
Which should defy the flight of Time,
Beneath dumb hieroglyphics groan,
The wonder of each age and clime!
And still they stand, in Winter's storms
And vernal Summer's rays benign,
Lifting on high grand, gloomy forms
Round which eternity may twine!
The Pyramids! When did they rear
Their sombre bulk to Time's stern gaze?
Caust estimate the thought -the care
The lives condemned---the flight of days---
That went to consecrate the pile
Where Egypt's tyrants now repose,
The sentient serpents of the Nile,
At whose command the phantoms rose?
Each stons cemented with the gore,
The tears and sweat of some poor slave!
For each dead king the millions bore
Into the gloomy vaults, his grave,
A thousand men, perchance, had bled,
Had sacrificed their all in death,
To guard the tyrant in his bed
And watch for his returning breath!
Yes; on the Future Life we build,
Rear crumbling monuments to fame,
When Death's remorseless clasp has stilled
The currents of the mortal frame!
Published in Colored American Magazine, January, 1906