Ionica | Page 8

I lead the tribes

Law shall strip you; threats nor bribes
Shall blunt the just man's
wrath."
How strongly, gravely did he speak!
I shivered, hid my tingling cheek

Behind thy marble face;
And prayed the gods to be like him,

Firm in temper, lithe of limb,
Right worthy of our race.
Oh, mother, didst thou bear me brave?
Or was I weak, till, from the
grave
So early hollowed out,
Tiberius sought me yesternight,

Blood upon his mantle white,
A vision clear of doubt?
What can I fear, oh mother, now?
His dead cold hand is on my brow;

Rest thou thereon thy lips:
His voice is in the night-wind's breath,

"Do as I did," still he saith;
With blood his finger drips.
ASTEROPE
Child of the summer cloud, upon thy birth,--
And thou art often born

to die again,--
Follow loud groans, that shake the darkening earth,

And break the troublous sleep of guilty men.
Thou leapest from the thinner streams of air
To crags where vapours
cling, where ocean frets;
No cave so deep, so cold, but thou art there,

Wrath in thy smile, and beauty in thy threats.
The molten sands beneath thy burning feet
Run, as thou runnest, into
tubes of glass;
Old towers and trees, that proudly stood to meet
The
whirlwind, let their fair invader pass.
The lone ship warring on the Indian sea
Bursts into splinters at thy
sudden stroke;
Siberian mines fired long ago by thee
Still waste in
helpless flame and barren smoke.
Such is thy dreadful pastime, Angel-queen,
When swooping headlong
from the Armament
Thou spreadest fear along the village green,

Fear of the day when gravestones shall be rent.
And we that fear remember not, that thou,
Slewest the Theban maid,
who vainly strove
To rival Juno, when the lover's vow
Was kept in
wedlock by unwilling Jove.
And we forget, that when Oileus went
From the wronged virgin and
the ruined fane,
When storms were howling round "Repent, Repent,"

Thy holy arrow pierced the spoiler's brain.
To perish all the proud! but chiefly he,
Who at the tramp of steeds
and cymbal-beat
Proclaimed, "I thunder! Why not worship me?"

And thou didst slay him for his counterfeit.
A DIRGE
Naiad, hid beneath the bank
By the willowy river-side,
Where
Narcissus gently sank,
Where unmarried Echo died,
Unto thy
serene repose
Waft the stricken Anterôs.

Where the tranquil swan is borne,
Imaged in a watery glass,
Where
the sprays of fresh pink thorn
Stoop to catch the boats that pass,

Where the earliest orchis grows,
Bury thou fair Anterôs.
Glide we by, with prow and oar:
Ripple shadows off the wave,
And
reflected on the shore,
Haply play about the grave.
Folds of
summer-light enclose
All that once was Anterôs.
On a flickering wave we gaze,
Not upon his answering eyes:

Flower and bird we scarce can praise,
Having lost his sweet replies:

Cold and mute the river flows
With our tears for Anterôs.
AN INVOCATION
I never prayed for Dryads, to haunt the woods again;
More welcome
were the presence of hungering, thirsting
men,
Whose doubts we
could unravel, whose hopes we
could fulfil,
Our wisdom tracing
backward, the river to the rill;
Were such beloved forerunners one
summer day
restored,
Then, then we might discover the Muse's
mystic hoard.
Oh dear divine Comatas, I would that thou and I
Beneath this broken
sunlight this leisure day might lie; Where trees from distant forests,
whose names were
strange to thee,
Should bend their amorous
branches within thy reach
to be,
And flowers thine Hellas knew not,
which art hath
made more fair,
Should shed their shining petals
upon thy fragrant
hair.
Then thou shouldst calmly listen with ever-changing
looks
To
songs of younger minstrels and plots of modern
books,
And wonder
at the daring of poets later born,
Whose thoughts are unto thy
thoughts as noon-tide is
to morn;
And little shouldst thou grudge
them their greater

strength of soul,
Thy partners in the torch-race,
though nearer to the
goal.

As when ancestoral portraits look gravely from the walls Uplift
youthful baron who treads their echoing
halls;
And whilst he builds
new turrets, the thrice ennobled
heir
Would gladly wake his
grandsire his home and feast
to share;
So from Ægean laurels that
hide thine ancient urn
I fain would call thee hither, my sweeter lore to
learn.
Or in thy cedarn prison thou waitest for the bee:
Ah, leave that simple
honey, and take thy food from
me.
My sun is stooping westward.
Entranced dreamer,
haste;
There's fruitage in my garden, that I
would have thee
taste.
Now lift the lid a moment; now, Dorian
shepherd,
speak:
Two minds shall flow together, the English and
the
Greek.
ACADEMUS
Perhaps there's neither tear nor smile,
When once beyond the grave.

Woe's me: but let me live meanwhile
Amongst the bright and
brave;
My summers lapse away beneath
Their cool Athenian shade:
And I
a string for myrtle-wreath,
A whetstone unto blade;
I cheer the games I cannot play;
As stands a crippled squire
To
watch his master through the fray,
Uplifted by desire.
I roam, where little pleasures fall,
As morn to morn succeeds,
To
melt, or ere the sweetness pall,
Like glittering manna-beads.
The wishes dawning in the eyes,
The softly murmured thanks;
The
zeal of those that miss the prize
On clamorous river-banks;
The quenchless hope, the honest choice,
The self-reliant pride,
The
music of the pleading voice
That will not be denied;

The wonder flushing in the cheek,
The questions many