HELEN, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore, That gently, o'er a perfumed sea, The weary, wayworn wanderer bore To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, Thy Naiad airs have brought me home To the glory that was Greece, To the grandeur that was Rome.
Lo! in yon brilliant window niche, How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand! Ah, Psyche, from the regions which Are Holy Land!
Lo! Death has reared himself a throne
In a strange city lying alone
Far down within the dim West,
Where the good and the bad, and the worst and the best, Have gone to their eternal rest.
There shrines and palaces and towers
(Time-eaten towers that tremble not!)
Resemble nothing that is ours.
Around, by lifting winds forgot,
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.
No rays from the Holy Heaven come down On the long night-time of that town; But light from out the lurid sea Streams up the turrets silently- Gleams up the pinnacles far and free- Up domes-up spires-up kingly halls- Up fanes-up Babylon-like walls- Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers- Up many and many a marvellous shrine Whose wreathéd friezes intertwine The viol, the violet, and the vine.
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.
So blend the turrets and shadows there That all seemed pendulous in air,
While from a proud tower in the town Death looks gigantically down.
There open fanes and gaping graves Yawn level with the luminous waves; But not the riches there that lie In each idol's diamond eye- Not the gaily-jewelled dead Tempt the waters from their bed; For no ripples curl, alas!
Along that wilderness of glass- No swellings tell that winds may be Upon some far-off happier sea-
No heavings hint that winds have been On seas less hideously serene.
But lo, a stir is in the air!
The wave-there is a movement there! As if the towers had thrust aside, In slightly sinking, the dull tide- As if their tops had feebly given
A void within the filmy Heaven. The waves have now a redder glow— The Hours are breathing faint and low- And when, amid no earthly moans,
Down, down that town shall settle hence, Hell; rising from a thousand thrones, Shall do it reverence.
Once it smiled a silent dell Where the people did not dwell; They had gone unto the wars, Trusting to the mild-eyed stars, Nightly, from their azure towers, To keep watch above the flowers, In the midst of which all day The red sun-light lazily lay. Now each visitor shall confess The sad valley's restlessness. Nothing there is motionless- Nothing save the airs that brood Over the magic solitude.
Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees
That palpitate like the chill seas Around the misty Hebrides!
Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven That rustle through the unquiet Heaven Unceasingly, from morn till even,
Over the violets there that lie
In myriad types of the human eye-- Over the lilies there that wave And weep above a nameless grave!
They wave-from out their fragrant tops Eternal dews come down in drops.
They weep:-from off their delicate stems Perennial tears descend in gems.
Ar midnight, in the month of June, I stand beneath the mystic moon. An opiate vapour, dewy, dim, Exhales from out her golden rim, And, softly dripping, drop by drop, Upon the quiet mountain top, Steals drowsily and musically Into the universal valley. The rosemary nods upon the The lily lolls upon the wave; Wrapping the fog about its breast, The ruin moulders into rest; Looking like Lethe, see! the lake A conscious slumber seems to take, And would not, for the world, awake. All Beauty sleeps!-and lo! where lies (Her casement open to the skies) Irene, with her Destinies!
Oh, lady bright! can it be right- This window open to the night? The wanton airs, from the tree-top, Laughingly through the lattice drop- The bodiless airs, a wizard rout, Flit through thy chamber in and out, And wave the curtain canopy So fitfully-so fearfully-
Above the closed and fringéd lid
'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies hid, That, o'er the floor and down the wall, Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall! Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear? Why and what art thou dreaming here?
Sure thou art come o'er far-off seas, A wonder to these garden trees! Strange is thy pallor! strange thy dress! Strange, above all, thy length of tress, And this all-solemn silentness !
The lady sleeps! Oh, may her sleep, Which is enduring, so be deep! Heaven have her in its sacred keep! This chamber changed for one more holy, This bed for one more melancholy,
I to God that she may lie pray
For ever with unopened eye,
While the dim sheeted ghosts go by!
As it is lasting, so be deep!
Soft may the worms about her creep! Far in the forest, dim and old, For her may some tall vault unfold- Some vault that oft hath flung its black And winged panels fluttering back, Triumphant, o'er the crested palls, Of her grand family funerals- Some sepulchre, remote, alone, Against whose portal she hath thrown, In childhood many an idle stone- Some tomb from out whose sounding door She ne'er shall force an echo more, Thrilling to think, poor child of sin! It was the dead who groaned within.
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