Thorold; And Other Poems

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1904. Excerpt: ... Prologue A goddess stood at my poor door and smiled--A goddess all in woven rainbows clad; And in her hand a sheaf of iris-buds, And by her side a tablet and a style, And on her lips the bloom, and in her eyes The light of radiant, never-fading youth. I knew her, and I cried: 0 glorious Muse! Thou that from immemorial years hast told To human kind so many famous tales, --In fashion varying with the changing time, --Hast thou, perhaps, another story left, And wilt thou tell it me? Slow smiling still The lovely apparition answered: Write! Eeport the epic Muse! Upon what hearth Of common use will burn celestial fire? Or, how, with feeble mortal pen, transcribe Words that in golden hours Immortals speak? The spiritual ear alone discerns Those harmonies that in our vulgar tongue Must then, how hardly, be interpreted--It will not be; yet must the scribe obey, Hearing that clear, imperious mandate: Write! I. Mid-afternoon in Arlen, warm and still The Palace lay. The sleepy sentinels Before the open gates stood stark upright, Save when a sudden, most suggestive lurch--Straightway atoned for by a stiller pose And glare of bristling indignation--showed The seeming statues human. Little stir Disquieted the halls within; all wooed, That might, the light siesta at this hour; And passing through the courts and corridors One might have thought to find the still retreat Wherein some lovely sleeper, dreaming, smiled In happy prescience of a kiss. Not so; The heart of all this drowsy peace was not A sleeping maiden, but a restless man. Far from the entrance gates, and at the end Of many a luxurious suite that lined Successive quadrangles, a broad stair led To where the Prince in his apartments paced Alone. Where the great windows faced the sea A splendid cloistered bal...