Dramatic and Later Poems

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 edition. Excerpt: ...light of the eyes of the Imam Hassan, thou art 'my beloved remembrance of him; ask me not this; urge me not, entreat me not; to have lost Ali-Akber is enough." I I Kassem answers: --"-That Kassem should live and Ali-Akber be martyred--sooner let the earth cover me! 0 king, be generous to the beggar at thy gate. See how my eyes run over with tears and my lips are dried up with thirst. Cast thine eyes toward the Waters of the heavenly Euphrates! I die of thirst, ' 'grant me, O thou marked of God, a full pitcher of the water of life! it flows in the Paradise which awaits me." Hussein still refuses; Kassem breaks forth in complaints and lamentations, his mother comes to him and learns the reason. She then says: --"Complain not against the Imam, light of my eyes, only by his order can the commission of martyrdom seventy witnesses, all righteous, and among the twoand-seventy is thy name. Know that thy destiny of death is commanded in the writing which thou wearest on thine arm." This writing is the testament of his father Hassan. He bears it in triumph to the Imam Hussein, who finds written there that he should, on the death-plain of Kerbela, suffer Kassem to have his will, but that he should marry him first to his daughter Zobeyda. "Consider," he says, "there lies Ali-Akber, mangled by Under this sky of ebon blackness, how can joy show her face? Nevertheless if thou commandest it, what have I to do but obey? Thy Kassem consents, though in astonishment. the enemies' hands! commandment is that of the Prophet, and his voice is that of God." reluctance of the intended bride and of all the women But Hussein has also to overcome the of his family. "Heir of the vicar of...