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Hephaestus : Persephone At Enna And Sappho In Leucadia
Hephaestus Persephone At Enna And Sappho In Leucadia Author:Arthur Stringer HEPHAESTUS; PERSEPHONE AT ENNA AND SAPPHO IN LEUCADIA - I903 - DEDICATION - WHAT bird that climbs the cool dim Dawn 13ut loves the air its wild wii gsr oam And yet when all the day is gone Rut turns its weary pinions home, And when the yellow twilight fills The lonely stretches of the West, Comes doivn across the darkened hills, Once more to its... more » remembered nest And I who strayed, 0 Fond and True, To seek that glory fugitive And fleeting music that is You, Rut echoes of yourself can give As through the waning gold I come To where the Dream and Dreamer meet Yet should my faltering lips be dumb, I I lay these gleanings at your feet HEPHAESTUS HEPHAESTUS H E P H A E S T U St h, th is w ge A P HRODITE is bed by his brother ARES, voZuntariGy surrena5rs the goddess to this younger brother, whom, it is said, APHRODIThEe rself pre ferred. TAKE her, 0 Ares As Demeter mourned Through many-fountained Enna, I shall grieve Forlorn a time, and then, it may be, learn, . Some still autumnal twilight by the sea Golden with sunlight, to remember not As the dark pine forgoes the pilgrim thrush I, sad of heart, yet unimpassioned, yield To you this surging bosom soft with dreams, This body fashioned of Aegean foam And languorous moonlight. But I give you not The eluding soul that in her broods and sleeps, And neer was mine of old, nor can be yours. It was not born of sea and moon with her, And though it nests within her, no weak hand Of hers shall cage it as it comes and goes, Sorrows and wakens, sleeps, and sings again. And so I give you but the hollow lute, The lute alone, and not the voices low That sang of old to some forgotten touch. The lamp I give, but not the glimmering flame Some alien fire must light, some alien dusk Enisle, ere it illume your land and sea. The shell I give you, Ares, not the song Of murmuring winds and waves once haunting it The cage, but not loves wings that come and go. I give you them, light brother, as the earth Gives up the dew, the mountain-side the mist Farewell sad face, that gleamed so like a flower Through Paphian groves to me of old-farewell Some Fate beyond our dark-robed Three ordained This love should wear the mortal rose and not Our timeless amaranth. Twas writ of old, and lay Not once with us. As we ourselves have known, And well your sad Dodonian mother found, From deep to deep the sails of destined love Are blown and tossed by tides no god controls And at the bud of our too golden life Eats this small canker of mortality I loved her once, 0 Ares-I loved her once as waters love the wind I sought her once as rivers seek the sea And her deep eyes, so dream-besieged, made dawn And midnight one. Flesh of my flesh she was, And we together knew dark days and glad. Then fell the change -some hand unknown to us Shook one white petal from the perfect flower, And all the world grew old. Ah, who shall say When Summer dies, or when is blown the rose Who, who shall know just when the quiet star Out of the golden West is born again Or when the gloaming saddens into night Twas writ, in truth, of old the tide of love Has met its turn, the long horizon lures The homing bird, the harbour calls the sail. Home, home to your glad heart she goes, while I Fare on alone, and only broken dreams Abide with me And yet, when you shall tread Lightly your sunlit hills with her and breathe Lifes keener air, all but too exquisite, Or look through purpling twilight on the world, Think not my heart has followed nevermore Those glimmering feet that walked once thus with me, Nor dream my passion by your passion paled. But lower than the god the temple stands As deeper is the sea than any wave, Sweeter the summer than its asphodel, So love far stronger than this woman is...« less