On Two of Signorelli's Frescoes

I THE RISING OF THE DEAD

I saw a vast bare plain, and, overhead,

A half-chilled sun that shed a sickly light;

While far and wide, till out of reach of sight,

The earth's thin crust was heaving with the dead.

Who, as they struggled from their dusty bed,

At first mere bones, by countless years made white,

Took gradual flesh, and stood all huddled tight

In mute, dull groups, as yet too numb to dread.

And all the while the summoning trump on high

With rolling thunder never ceased to shake

The livid vault of that unclouded sky,

Calling fresh hosts of skeletons to take

Each his identity; until well-nigh

The whole dry worn-out earth appeared to wake.

II THE BINDING OF THE LOST

In monstrous caverns, lit but by the glare

From pools of molten stone, the lost are pent

In silent herds, — dim, shadowy, vaguely blent,

Yet each alone with his own black despair;

While, through the thickness of the lurid air,

The flying fiends, from some far unseen vent,

Bring on their bat-wing'd backs, in swift descent,

The souls who swell the waiting myriads there.

And then begins the binding of the lost

With snaky thongs, before they be transferred

To realms of utter flame or utter frost;

And, like a sudden ocean boom, is heard,

Uprising from the dim and countless host,

Pain's first vague roar, Hell's first wild useless word.