The Battle of the Kings

Chedorlaomer of Elam,
The eldest of conquering kings,
Established a mighty empire
In the grey beginning of things;
In the plain of the four great rivers
That come from fountains unknown,
In the paradise realm of Babel,
He set and established his throne.

Beside him thundered in battle,
And beside him reveled at feast,
Three monarchs who did him homage
For ancient domains in the east,
The king of the land of Shinar,
And the king of Ellasar's land,
And Tidal king of the tribesmen
Who wander the southern sand.

In the days of our father Abram
These four took counsel to smite
The citied vale of the Jordan
And the hills of the Amorite;
They gathered their tufted lances,
They gathered their crescent bows,
And quitted the templed valley
Where arrowy Hiddekel flows.

Athwart the mid-river desert
They spread their locust wings;
Devouring the green oases
And drinking a-dry the springs;
Devouring the shepherd nomads
And the smiths who dwell in caves;
Devouring the trains of merchants,
And leaving behind but graves.

The eastward border of Bashan
They harried with bow and spear;
They smote the giant Rephaim
And the Horite dwellers in Seir;
The Zuzim, sons of the giants,
And the Emim of Kiriathaim;
Yea, all the valley of Jordan
They reddened with blood and flame.

So warring bitterly onward
And filling the earth with wail,
They came to the Dead Sea cities,
The towns of the bitumen vale,
The cities Gomorrah and Sodom,
Renowned in cycles of old
For music and dance and revel,
And for treasure of silver and gold.

Now Birsha, king of Gomorrah,
Held feast in his tower of pride
With Bera tyrant of Sodom
And many a chief beside;
The table sparkled with goblets
Wrought by the Canaanite,
And the goblets bubbled over
With wine of amber light.

The dancers and dancing women,
With wantoning smile and glance,
Wound slowly adown the mazes
Of Ashteroth's wicked dance;
While harp and organ and cymbal
And dulcimer poured their glee,
For the sons of Jubal were cunning
In lands of the bitumen sea.

But right in the midst of the joyance
A whimpering reached the hall,
As though the city Gomorrah
Were wailing already its fall;
And heralds shouted to Birsha
That Kadesh was flaming high,
And that up from the southland desert
Chedorlaomer drew nigh.

Then leaped up Birsha and Bera
With faces like withered leaves,
Forsaking the brimming goblets,
The flesh of sheep and of beeves;
They called for helmet and buckler,
For javelin, brand and bow,
And swiftly through scared Gomorrah
They hasted to meet the foe;

Commanding heralds to summon
Their allies, the king of Zoar,
And the kings of Zeboim and Admah,
Five kings to battle with four;
Commanding also to rally
And marshal their native powers,
And to set the phalanx of battle
In front of Gomorrah's towers.

Thereon, in the vale of Siddim;
In the vale of the marvellous mere,
Where now the apples are ashes
And the birds soar high in fear;
In the rich, hot Dead Sea valley
The clamor of war began,
The shock of nation with nation,
The wrestle of man with man.

Long wavered the balance even,
Four kings in battle with five;
For long did the brazen tempest
Both forward and backward drive;
For the men of the stranger peoples
Were valiant and trained to strife,
While the men of the Siddim cities
Were fighting for land and life.

At last the chief of the spoilers,
Chedorlaomer the strong,
Smote Birsha, king of Gomorrah,
With an arrow weighty and long,
That clove his glittering harness
And pierced his wicked heart,
On one side trembling the feather,
On one side gleaming the dart.

Thereon the sheikhs of the city,
Beholding their chieftain fall,
Tottered and tumbled asunder
Like stones of a battered wall;
While, smitten with menial terror,
The common herd turned to fly,
None fearing to stain his manhood,
But only fearing to die.

Then Tidal, king of the Nomads,
Led on his mingled breeds,
And parted the ranks of Sodom
As a lion parts Jordan's reeds;
The rush of his swarthy archers
Was like a hurricane's breath,
And the serpent hiss of their arrows
Fulfilled the noontide with death.

Back reeled the Sodomite bucklers,
King Shinab fell in his gore,
Back trembled the spear of Admah,
The sword of Zeboim and Zoar,
Till, smitten at every footstep,
The men of the valley fled,
With ear turned over the shoulder
To hear the pursuer's tread.

The bitumen pits of Siddim
Were choked with wounded and slain,
And the yellow ripples of Jordan
Bore many a crimson stain.
Right through the gates of the cities
The torrent of battle roared,
And tower and temple and palace
Re-echoed the clank of the sword.

The carven and molten idols
Saved not their worshippers then,
And the heathen altars were dabbled
With the blood of heathenish men,
While hither and yon the spoilers
Ran, gathering wealth untold
Of armor and goodly garments
And graven silver and gold.

Then perished the wise in counsel,
And perished the strong. in war,
While the youths and maidens were herded
And driven to serve afar;
Yea, only a feeble remnant
A remnant goaded and pressed,
Escaped to the arid mountains
That shadowed the sunset west.

Now Lot, the nephew of Abram,
With sheep and cattle in store,
Wide feeding from mount to river,
Abode in the Siddim Ghor;
In peace abode and in plenty
Till El should punish his sin
Of strife with our father Abram,
The chief of his clan and kin.

The patriarch's beard was lifted
In prayer and his knees were bent,
When the camel-riders of Tidal
Drew halter before his tent,
And leaned on their spears, awe-stricken,
Believing him half divine,
So august he seemed and holy,
And so did his countenance shine,

He knelt, but not to the foeman;
He rose, but drew not his sword.
His soul was bowed in contrition: —
How should he strive with the Lord?
Then Tidal, kissing his forehead,
Said, "Follow, O prophet and priest;
And thou shalt serve at the altars
Of Bel in the templed east."

So gently the spoilers guided
The chief and his daughters twain,
His herders and flocks and cattle,
In honor along the plain;
In honor and fear they led him,
Yet suffered him not to go,
For El had blinded their spirits
In order to work them woe.

Now messengers came to Abram,
Who held his pasture and fold
In the country of hoary Hebron,
By Hittites builded of old;
With garments rent and with weeping
They told how a stranger band
Was bearing Lot and his people
To Bel Merodach's land.

Then bowed the reverend ancient.
He bowed and prayed in grief,
"Now help us, El of the Hebrews;
Now guide us and be our chief.
Our foes are many and mighty;
They deafen the earth with boasts:
But thou canst give us the battle,
For thou art the Lord of Hosts."

This said, his glittering falchion
He girded on, and then
Led eastward his valiant herders,
Three hundred and eighteen men,
With Aner and Eshcol and Mamre,
Three clans of the Amorite,
Who banded with him in vengeance
For kinsmen slain in fight.

They passed the hilltop of Jebus,
Where Zion now lifts her wall;
They passed the mount of Gilboa
(Since red with the blood of Saul);
They entered the vale of Jordan
And forded the arrowy tide;
At last, in the skirts of Haran
The foeman's camp they spied.

Its countless fires of feasting
Flaunted an insolent glare,
And a clamor of drunken revel
Blasphemed through the twilit air,
The babble of heathen thousands
Who jeered at the captive's moan,
And scoffed at the God of Abram,
And vaunted their idols of stone.

Then said the chief of the Hebrews,
"God giveth them into our hand.
Divide ye quickly, my children,
Each ancient leading his band.
Lie close till the fires are feeble;
Then circle the Elamite horde.
Await my summoning trumpet;
Then strike in the might of the Lord."

In the thickest of night the signal
Of Abram shattered the gloom;
It roared through the plain like a lion,
It scared like the trumpet of doom;
While forward the ambushers bounded
Like hunters who close on the prey,
And sought the throats of the heathen,
And slew till the breaking of day.

Full many the sleepers who perished
Or ever they opened the eye,
Or wakened to gaze on the slayer
One terrible moment, and die.
Oh, mighty and swift was the slaughter;
It ran and consumed like a flame.
The corpses were piled upon corpses
Wherever the ambushers came.

And direr yet was the horror
When the rabble of pagans rose,
Drowsy and stumbling and groping,
To battle with unseen foes;
For comrade wrestled with comrade
And people with people strove,
While everywhither, at random,
The arrows of Tidal drove.

In vain the shouting of captains,
The scream of trumpets in vain;
In vain the kings of the nations
Clamored and beckoned amain;
For the very princes and nobles
Recked not of banner or Crown,
And the soldiers, maddened with panic,
Went beating each other down.

Yea, even the glow of morning
Redoubled the crazed affright;
No fugitive turned to chasten
The handful that gored the flight;
The stricken host of the aliens
Dissolved and vanished like dew,
While fiercely our father Abram
Pursued, made captive and slew.

Past snowy Hermon he chased them
To Hobah, beyond the plain
Where ancient Damascus glitters
'Mid olives and figs and grain.
He gathered the beeves and camels
That the archers of Tidal drave,
And dried the tears of the orphan,
And brake the bonds of the slave.

But, gladdest of all his triumphs,
He rescued his brother's son,
His daughters and herders and cattle,
Not lacking a single one.
How beautiful were the kinsmen,
How princely in mien and face,
When, weeping, they kissed each other,
And honored El for his grace!

So Abram returned in glory
The hero of Jordan's land,
While shoutings of grateful peoples
Resounded on every hand;
Wherever he fared, the elders
Of cities brought corn and wine,
Bowing their heads and revering
The savior of Palestine.

And when to the hill of Hebron
His lordly journey drew nigh,
Melchizedec, monarch of Salem,
The priest of the Great Most High,
Came forth to meet him and greet him
With holy hands lifted in praise,
Came forth to caress him, and bless him
In the name of the Ancient of Days.