A woman lay beside him,-so it seemed;
For on her marble shoulders, like a mist
Irradiate with tawny moonrise, gleamed

Thick silken tresses; her white woman's wrist,
Glittering with snaky gold and amethyst,
Upheld a dainty chin; and there beneath,

Her twin breasts shone like pinks that lilies wreathe.

What colour were her eyes I cannot tell;

For as he gazed thereon, at times they darted Dun rays like water in a dusky well;

Then turned to topaz: then like rubies smarted With smouldering flames of passion tiger-hearted; Then 'neath blue-veinèd lids swam soft and tender With pleadings and shy timorous surrender.

Thus far a woman: but the breath that lifted
Her panting breast with long melodious sighs,
Stirred o'er her neck and hair broad wings that sifted
The perfumes of meridian Paradise;

Dusk were they, furred like velvet, gemmed with eyes Of such dull lustre as in isles afar

Night-flying moths spread to the summer star.

Music these pinions made-a sound and surge
Of pines innumerous near lisping waves—
Rustling of reeds and rushes on the verge

Of level lakes and naiad-haunted caves-
Drowned whispers of a wandering stream that laves
Deep alder-boughs and tracts of ferny grass
Bordered with azure-belled campanulas.

Potent they were: for never since her birth
With feet of woman this fair siren pressed
Sleek meadow swards or stony ways of earth;
But 'neath the silken marvel of her breast,
Displayed in sinuous length of coil and crest,
Glittered a serpent's tail, fold over fold,
In massy labyrinths of languor rolled.

Ah, me! what fascination! what faint stars
Of emerald and opal, with the shine

Of rubies intermingled, and dim bars

Of twisting turquoise and pale coralline!

What rings and rounds! what thin streaks sapphirine Freckled that gleaming glory, like the bed

Of Eden streams with gems enamelled!

There lurked no loathing, no soul-freezing fear,
But luxury and love these coils between :
Faint grew the boy; the siren filled his ear
With singing sweet as when the village-green
Re-echoes to the tinkling tambourine,

And feet of girls aglow with laughter glance
In myriad mazy errors of the dance.

How long he dallied with delusive joy

I know not but thereafter never more
The peace of passionless slumber soothed the boy;
For he was stricken to the very core
With sickness of desire exceeding sore,

And through the radiance of his eyes there shone
Consuming fire too fierce to gaze upon.

He, ere he died—and they whom lips divine
Have touched, fade flower-like and cease to be-
Bade Charicles on agate carve a sign

Of his strange slumber: therefore can we see
Here in the ruddy gem's transparency

The boy, the myrtle boughs, the triple spell
Of moth and snake and white witch terrible.

III.

FOR ONE OF GIAN BELLINI'S LITTLE
ANGELS.

Y task it is to stand beneath the throne,

Με

To stand and wait, while those grave presences, Prophet and priest and saint and seraph, zone Our Lady with the Child upon her knees: They from mild lips receive the messages Of peace and love, which thence to men below They shower soft-falling like pure flakes of snow.

I meanwhile wait; and very mute must be
My music, lest I break the golden trance
Of bliss celestial, or with childish glee

Trouble the fount of divine utterance.

Yet when those lips are tired of speech, perchance It may be that the royal babe will lie

And slumber to my whispered lullaby:

Then all those mighty brows will rest, and peace
Descend like dew on that high company.
Therefore I stand and wait, but do not cease

To clasp my lute, that silver melody,

When our dear Lady bends her smile on me, Forth from my throat and from these thrilling strings Dove-like may soar and spread ethereal wings.

BACK

LYRICS OF LIFE.

JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.

I.

ὑποθήκη εἰς ἐμαυτόν.

CK to thy books! The swift hours spent in vain
Are flown and gone:

Thou hast no charm to lure them, or regain
What loss hath won.

Up from thy sleep! The dream of idle love,
So frail and fair,

Hath vanished, and its golden wings above
Melt in mid air.

Stand not, nor gaze astonied at the skies,
Serenely cold:

They have no answer for thine eager eyes;
Thy tale is told.

Fool, in all folly cradled, swathed from sense,
To trust a toy;

To purchase from pronounced indifference
A shallow joy;

To leave thy studious native heights untrod
For that low soil,

Where momentary blossoms deck the sod;
To pant and toil

In hungry chasings of the painted fly,
That fluttered past—

Back to thy summits, where what cannot die
Survives the blast!

There, throned in solitary calm, forget
Who wrung thy heart:

Long hours and days of silent years may yet
Restore a part

Of that large heritage and realm sublime,
Which, love-elate,

Thou fain would'st barter for the fields that time
Makes desolate.

G'

II.

χοινὰ τὰ τῶν φίλων.

IVE freely to the friend thou hast ;
Unto thyself thou givest:

On barren soil thou canst not cast,
For by his life thou livest.

Nay, this alone doth trouble me-
That I should still be giving
Through him unto myself, when he
Is love within me living.

I fain would give to him alone,
Nor let him guess the giver;

Like dews that drop on hills unknown,
To feed a lordly river.