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(From The Ship in the Desert)
AND yet again through the watery miles | |
| Of reeds I rowed till the desolate isles | |
| Of the black bead-makers of Venice are not. | |
| I touched where a single sharp tower is shot | |
| To heaven, and torn by thunder and rent | 5 |
| As if it had been Time’s battlement. | |
| A city lies dead, and this great gravestone | |
| Stands at its head like a ghost alone. | |
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| Some cherry-trees grow here, and here | |
| An old church, simple and severe | 10 |
| In ancient aspect, stands alone | |
| Amid the ruin and decay, all grown | |
| In moss and grasses. Old and quaint, | |
| With antique cuts of martyred saint, | |
| The gray church stands with stooping knees, | 15 |
| Defying the decay of seas. | |
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| Her pictured Hell, with flames blown high, | |
| In bright mosaics wrought and set | |
| When man first knew the Nubian art, | |
| Her bearded saints, as black as jet; | 20 |
| Her quaint Madonna, dim with rain | |
| And touch of pious lips of pain, | |
| So touched my lonesome soul, that I | |
| Gazed long, then came and gazed again, | |
| And loved, and took her to my heart. | 25 |
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| Nor monk in black, nor Capuchin, | |
| Nor priest of any creed was seen. | |
| A sun-browned woman, old and tall, | |
| And still as any shadow is, | |
| Stole forth from out the mossy wall | 30 |
| With massive keys, to show me this; | |
| Came slowly forth, and following, | |
| Three birds, and all with drooping wing. | |
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| Three mute brown babes of hers; and they,— | |
| O, they were beautiful as sleep, | 35 |
| Or death, below the troubled deep. | |
| And on the pouting lips of these | |
| Red corals of the silent seas, | |
| Sweet birds, the everlasting seal | |
| Of silence that the God has set | 40 |
| On this dead island sits for aye. | |
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| I would forget, yet not forget, | |
| Their helpless eloquence. They creep | |
| Somehow into my heart, and keep | |
| One bleak, cold corner, jewel set. | 45 |
| They steal my better self away | |
| To them, as little birds that day | |
| Stole fruits from out the cherry-trees. | |
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| So helpless and so wholly still, | |
| So sad, so wrapped in mute surprise, | 50 |
| That I did love, despite my will. | |
| One little maid of ten—such eyes, | |
| So large and lonely, so divine, | |
| Such pouting lips, such peachy cheek— | |
| Did lift her perfect eyes to mine, | 55 |
| Until our souls did touch and speak; | |
| Stood by me all that perfect day, | |
| Yet not one sweet word could she say. | |
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| She turned her melancholy eyes | |
| So constant to my own, that I | 60 |
| Forgot the going clouds, the sky, | |
| Found fellowship, took bread and wine, | |
| And so her little soul and mine | |
| Stood very near together there. | |
| And O, I found her very fair. | 65 |
| Yet not one soft word could she say; | |
| What did she think of all that day? | |
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| The sometime song of gondolier | |
| Is heard afar. The fishermen | |
| Betimes draw net by ruined shore, | 70 |
| In full spring-time when east-winds fall; | |
| Then traders row with muffled oar, | |
| Tedesco or the turbaned Turk, | |
| The pirate, at some midnight work | |
| By watery wall,—but that is all. | 75 |
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