EPILOGUE
A DEATH IN THESSALY.!
Mévos Oewy yap Odvaros ob Swowr pa.
—AESCH., Fr. Niobe. |
FAREWELL!
Althzean !
The strange fruits lure me of Persephone ;
I raise the last, the memorable pean,
Storm-throated, mouthed as the cave-roll-
ing sea ;
I lift the cup : deep draughts of blue Lethean !
My wine to me.
O Light of day, O torch
O lamentable season of Apollo,
When swoops his glory to the golden
wave !
As all his children, so their lord shall follow !
The flower he slew, the maiden he would
save,
As Itylus,? light woven, tuned! Oh swallow,
Bewail their grave!
The gracious breast of Artemis may light me_
To men—yet loved I ever Artemis?
Surely the vine-song and the dance delight
me,
The sea-blue bowers where Aphrodite is,
Terrible gods and destinies excite me,
The strange sad kiss.
Thus may no moon tell Earth my story after,
No virgin sing my fame as virginal.
1 The northern portion of Greece. It was
renowned for wizard rites.
2 See Swinburne, Poems and Ballads, 1st
Series.
Yet some night-leaves the southern stream
| may waft her,
; Some amorous nymph across the wood
. may call .
| A loud mad chant; love, tears, harsh sombre
laughter.
No more at all.
"Oh, mother, Oh, Demeter, in my burthen
' Let me assume thy sorrow singular ;
A branching temple and an altar earthen,
A fire of herbs, a clayen water-jar;
An olive grove to bind the sacred girth in
Lone woods afar.
Let life burn gently thence, as when the
ember )
In one faint incense-puff to shrineward
dies. |
No care, no pain, no craving to remember,
One leap toward the knees and destinies,
Where shine Her lips like flames, Her
breasts like amber,
Like moons Her eyes.
For my heart turns—ah still !—in Sorrow’s
traces,
Where sad chill footprints pash the sodden
leaves ;
Where ranged around me are the cold, gray
faces 3
Fallen on the stubbleare the rottensheaves ;
The vicious ghosts abound; and Chronos’
paces
No soul deceives,
263