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Saturn by CAS

Saturn Now were the Titans gathered round their king In a waste region slipping toward the verge Of drear extremities that clasp the world— A land half-moulded by the hasty gods, Grotesque, misfeatured, blackly gnarled with stone, And left beneath the bright scorn of the stars; Or worn and marred from conflict with the deep, Conterminate, of Chaos. Here they stood, Old Saturn midmost, like a central peak Among the lesser mounts that guard its base. Defeat, that gloamed within each countenance Like the first tinge of death, upon a sun Gathering like some dusk vapor, found them cold, Heavy of limb, and halting as with weight Of threatened worlds and trembling firmaments. A wind cried round them like a trumpet-voice Of phantom hosts—hurried, importunate, And intermittent with a tightening fear. Far off the sunset sprang, and the hard clouds, Molten among the peaks, seemd furnaces In which to make the fetters of the world. Seared by the lightning of the younger gods, They saw, beyond the

The City in the Desert by Clark Ashton Smith

A poem by CAS: The City in the Desert In a lost land, that only dreams have known, Where flaming suns walk naked and alone; Among horizons bright as molten brass, And glowing heavens like furnaces of glass, It rears with dome and tower manifold, Rich as a dawn of amarant and gold, Or gorgeous as the Phoenix, born of fire, And soaring from an opalescent pyre Sheer to the zenith. Like some anademe Of Titan jewels turned to flame and dream The city crowns the far horizon-light Over the flowered meads of damassin .... A desert isle of madreperl ! wherein The thurifer and opal-fruited palm And heaven-thronging minarets becalm The seas of azure wind.... (Note: These lines were remembered out of a dream, and are given verbatim.) Clark Ashton Smith, 1922