Collected Works (Vol. II)

ANIMA LUNAE 39 And all the palace drowsed away The hours that fanned with silken fold ‘The progress of the Lord of Day. Yet, as he slept, a grey Shadow of dream drew near, and stooped And glided through the ranks of slaves, Leaving no shadow where they drooped, No echo in the architraves As silent as the grave’s. That shape vibrated to the tune Of thought lulled low; the stirless swoon Half felt its fellow gather close, Yet stirred not: now the intruder moves, Turns the tune slowlier to grave rows Of palm trees, losing life in loves Less turbid than the mildest dream That ever stirred the stream Whereon night floats, a shallop faint, Ivory and silver bow and beam, Dim-figured with the images Divinely quaint Of gold engraved, forth shadowing sorceries. So the king dreamed of love: and passing on The shape moved quicker, winnowing with faint fans The soundlessair of thought : the noonday sun Seemed to the mightiest of a thousand khans Like to a man’s Brief life—a thousand such dream spans !— And so he dreamed of life: and failing _ plumes Wrought through ancestral looms In the man’s brain: and so he dreamed of death. And slower still the grey God wrought Dividing consciousness from breath, And life and death from thought. So the king dreamed of Nought. Yet subtly-shapen was this Nothingness, Not mere negation, as before that dream Drew back the veil of sleep; But strange: the king turned idly, sought to press The bosom where love lately burnt supreme, And found no ivory deep. He turned and sought out life ; and nothing lived : Death, and nought died. The king’s brow fell. Sore grieved He rose, not knowing :.and before his will Swan’s throat, dove’s eyes, moon’s breast, and woman’s mouth, And form desirable Of all the clustered love drew back: grew still ‘*O turn, my lover, turn thee to the South!” The girl’s warm song of the Siesta’s hour. lieedless of all that flower, Eager to feel the strong brown fingers close On the unshrinking rose And pluck it to his breast to perish there ; With neither thought nor care Nor knowledge he went forth: none stay, none dare Proffer a pavid prayer. There was a pavement bright with emerald Glittering on malachite Clear to the Sun: low battlements enwalled With gold the ground enthralled, Sheer to the sight Of sun and city: thither in his trance The king’s slow steps advance. There stood he, and with eyes unfolded far (Clouds shadowing a star Or moonlight seen through trees—so came the lashes Over—and strong sight flashes !) Travelled in thought to life, and in its gleam Saw but a doubtful dream. His was a city crescent-shaped whose wall Was brass and iron: in the thrall Of the superb concave Lay orbed a waveless wave. Four moons of liquid light revolved and threw Their silvery fountains forth, whose fruitful dew Turned all the plain to one enamelled vale Green as the serpent’s glory, and—how still! —To where the distant hill Shaped like an Oread’s! breast arose beyond, Across the starless pond 1 Mountain nymph,