LXXVI

"Yet pull not down my palace towers, that are

So lightly, beautifully built:

Perchance I may return with others there

When I have purged my guilt."

One was the Tishbite whom the raven fed,

As when he stood on Carmel-steeps,

With one arm stretched out bare, and mocked and said,

"Come cry aloud—be sleeps."

Tall, eager, lean and strong, his cloak windborne

Behind, his forehead heavenly-bright

From the clear marble pouring glorious scorn,

Lit as with inner light.

One was Olympias: the floating snake

Rolled round her ancles, round her waist

Knotted, and folded once about her neck,

Her perfect lips to taste

Round by the shoulder moved; she seeming blythe

Declined her head: on every side

The dragon's curves melted and mingled with

The woman's youthful pride

Of rounded limbs.

Hither, when all the deep unsounded skies

Shuddered with silent stars, she clomb,

And as with optic glasses her keen eyes

Pierced thro' the mystic dome,

Regions of lucid matter taking forms,

Brushes of fire, hazy gleams,

Clusters and beds of worlds, and bee-like swarms

Of suns, and starry streams.

She saw the snowy poles of moonless Mars,

That marvellous round of milky light

Below Orion, and those double stars

Whereof the one more bright

Is circled by the other, &c.