62 JEPHTHAH.
Flowers the ocean bears.
All the garb that gladness wears
To a rent uncouth attire
Changed with cares ;
Happy songs our love had made
Ere the sun had sunk his fire, -
In the moonrise fall and fade,
And the dregs of our desire
Fall away to death ;
Tears divide our labouring breath
That our sister—O our sister !
Moon and sun and stars have kissed her
She must touch the lips of death,
Touch the lips whose coldness saith :
Thou art clay.
Let us fare away, away
To the ice whose ocean gray
Tumbles on the beach of rock,
Where the wheeling vultures mock
Our distress with horrid cries,
Where the flower relenting dies,
And the sun is sharp to slay ;
Where the ivory dome above
Glimmers like the dawn of love
On the weary way ;
Where the ibex chant and call
Over tempest’s funeral ;
Where the horndd beast is shrill,
And the eagle hath his will,
And the shadows fall